


a guidance and a mercy

by mahistrado



Category: SKAM (TV)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fix-It, M/M, OR IS IT, We Are All Rewriting Season 4, anti-racist, bye white demon julie andem, there will be Gays, unrequited nooreva :'(, we outchea for the browns
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-21
Packaged: 2018-11-21 20:21:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 22,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11364927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mahistrado/pseuds/mahistrado
Summary: This is a story about Sana, her faith, a great love, and the ones who love her. This world wasn't made for her, but we’re here to remake it in her image, one brave act of resistance at a time. The season that should have been. Post-4.5.





	1. episode 6

_wednesday 9:35_

_WISH U WOULD_

“Maybe I’ve realized that it goes against my values to watch girls lose all of their self-respect for a pinecone attached to their _russehat_.”

It feels deeply satisfying to make Vilde flinch on purpose instead of just by being Muslim for once. It feels like _power_ when she spins on her heel and leaves them there, gaping and confused. It’s not, though. She can tell by the way her stomach immediately drops when she clears the threshold to the hallway, and how she has to fight to keep her gaze forward, _don’t check to see if they’re looking, just walk._

“Sana!”

Sana’s eyes flicker to the door of her Biology classroom down the hall, and she decides she isn’t going to stop. She can hear the steps behind her get faster until Eva catches her by the wrist and tugs gently.

Sana turns back violently. “What?”

“Whoa,” Eva says, taking a step back with her palms raised in surrender. “Serious? What happened? You didn't even tell us first?”

Sana purses her lips, crosses her arms across her chest. It’s not Eva’s fault, she knows that. Eva is just part of the whole _thing_. “So?”

Eva’s eyebrows screw together. Her heart is so sweet that her expression isn’t even tinged with frustration yet and it makes Sana _angry._ She doesn't understand people who aren’t mad when they deserve to be mad. Sana doesn’t think she’s ever felt close to grace like that, where she could look on someone being rude to her with curiosity rather than hostility. 

“ _So,”_ Eva says slowly, drawing out the word with her lips in a perfect O. “You’re the one who wanted to join with Pepsi-Max and now you're ditching us with them?”

Sana tips her chin up, just enough that she has to look down at Eva. “You’re fine without me.” 

Eva stares at her, soft confusion on her face, just a small tightening around the eyes, tilt of her head. Sana gets an ugly urge to say something completely rude, like _does it really matter to you if i’m around when you're so drunk you can't even stand every weekend_. 

“Biology,” Sana says in dismissal, shrugging with one shoulder and turning back towards the classroom. 

  


* * *

  


_wednesday 17:46_

_the boys_

  


* * *

  


_thursday 11:59_

_fake, fake, fake_

“Sana, are you joining us?” Eva says, and Sana snaps to attention. 

“Huh?” Sana says, eyebrows furrowing as her mind backtracks to try and recover the topic of conversation. 

“Hallo?” Eva singsongs playfully. “Are you even in there lately?”

Sana purses her lips in what she hopes is an approximation of a smile and shrugs. “Sorry. Studying.” 

“ _O-kay_ ,” Eva says, drawing out each syllable. “Are you joining us for Maccas?”

Sana peers back down at her notes before looking up to reply, like she’s checking on her progress. Like there’s any chance in hell that she’d spend recreational time with Noora. She trains her gaze on Eva. “No, no thanks.”

Eva nods, and she raises her thumb to her mouth, chewing on the cuticle as she waits for Noora to gather her bag. Then her eyes go wide. “Oh my god, Ramadan hasn’t started yet, right?”

There was a time where Eva remembering Ramadan might have made her feel seen, feel loved. But today, it just makes her feel defensive, more aware of her otherness than before. Sana wonders how deep this anger has drilled down, wonders what it’s doing to her heart. Sana stares at her for a moment longer before shaking her head curtly. 

Eva relaxes, shouldering her backpack. Noora tilts her head, and Sana’s eyes dart over to her. 

“Do you want us to get you anything?” Noora says, gaze clear and direct, untroubled. It’s so tacitly _ridiculous_ in the face of everything that’s happened that Sana wants, suddenly and urgently, to slap her. Her palms tingle with it. She blinks and the urge dissipates. 

“No thanks,” Sana says shortly, shifting to settle more fully against the window, clicking her pen open and closed.

“Alright,” Eva says, turning to leave. “Talk to you later!”

They leave after that, but Sana doesn’t bother looking up to watch them. She looks out the window and sees them come out and embrace Vilde where she’s chatting with Sara. It makes Sana feel sick to her stomach, the betrayal and shame and anger all bubbling red and possessive in her chest. She extends the nib of her pen with a click and presses the point into her thumb for something to focus on.

“Did Sara steal your friends or something?” 

“Huh?” Sana jumps, and her head snaps around painfully to see Isak, hands gripping the straps of his backpack and leaning close to peer over her shoulder out the window. “No! _”_

“No?” He takes a step back, grinning once he catches sight of her murderous expression “Okay, I’m kidding.”

Sana rolls her eyes, and slides her eyes back to the scene at the window so she doesn’t have to look at him. His eye is still kind of blacked, and it’s a nasty reminder of yet another thing gone to shit. 

She expects Isak to wander away after that, but he stays, following her gaze out the window. “Fake, fake, fake,” he says, shaking his head. “Ugh, girls.”

His tone, and her stubborn loyalty makes her turn and shoot him a sharp look. 

“ _You’re_ calling girls fake?” she asks in disbelief. She raises her eyebrows, looks intentionally towards Eva. “I know plenty of _girls_ who are much less fake than you.

“Ow, jeeze, fucking harsh.” He flinches, eyes darting to look at Eva down on the grounds and back to Sana. “Not– not all girls, Jesus Christ, obviously. Just – you know, those girls. Sara. _Pepsi-Max_ , all of them.”

He gestures as Sara wraps her arms around Vilde, and they giggle, falling together in a skinny, blonde, carefree bundle. Sana’s heartbeat speeds, gassed up with scorn and judgement, vicious and thick. 

Isak scoffs. “Like, look now – Sara doesn’t even like Vilde.” 

Sara furrows her eyebrows and stares at him. “How do you know that?”

“She told me,” he says, raising an eyebrow at her. 

She squints at him. “ _You_ talk to Sara?”

Isak looks back out the window, exhaling before looking back at her from the corner of his eye and commenting wryly: “We were in a relationship.”

“Hm,” Sana hums in acknowledgement, feeling odd and off-balance. It doesn’t feel like remembering something she forgot at all – it feels like something imported from a whole different universe, seams on the memory still showing where it was cut and pasted into the fabric of reality. “That’s right.”

Sana stares at Sara and tries to remember what it was like to see her and Isak together. Vilde tucks her face contently into Sara’s neck, and Sana’s mind immediately supplies an image of Vilde and Magnus spitting coffee into each other's mouths. She thinks it was probably much like that. 

“How did you stand it?” she asks distantly. 

He doesn't respond right away. Both of their minds are far away, trapped behind glass.

“It wasn’t a very sexual relationship, to put it that way,” Isak replies. “We mostly chatted. I was more of an online therapist than a boyfriend, honestly.”

Sana looks back over at him as he continues, mouth quirked up in a dry grin, “I would’ve loved some payment for all that time I spent reading shit talk about russ friends and stuff. I couldn’t give more of a fuck.”

She hates Sara, but she can’t stop herself from biting out, “Don’t you think lying about having feelings for her balances it out?”

Isak looks at her like she’s spoken in Arabic, and she replays the sentence in her mind to make sure that she hadn’t.

“Hallo?” she prompts, leaning forwards a bit and tilting her head for emphasis.

Isak shakes himself out of whatever was holding him in place, and huffs out a laugh. “Okay, Sana.” 

Anger flares in her stomach at the dismissal, but his black eye keeps her quiet. 

“Hey! Sister species are species which are determined morphologically?” he asks with an expectant grin.

“No,” she says bluntly. “Sister species are species which are similar in exterior traits, but which can be completely different genetically.”

He smiles cheerily and replies, “I’ll go hang myself now, then!”

He turns on his heel and disappears up the stairs, but his parting words settle heavily in her stomach. Sana stares after him for a long time, eyes narrowed and mind working. 

  


* * *

  


_thursday 12:15_

  


* * *

  


_thursday 18:55_

_the one & only_

Sana can barely stand to look at Elias lately and his texts send twisting waves of repulsion and humiliation through her chest. She reads _Can you cook some food for us?_ and her mind flashes back, _Vilde said he calls her slave; I mean, they're gay and those boys are Muslim, so_ ; _no wonder she’s psycho._

She locks her phone and sits back against her headboard. The light is dying outside of the window, past the oranges of sunset and into the depressing grays of dusk. She tries to empty her mind, let go of her anger, but it just claws her insides, pulsing and bright red. She clenches her jaw and her leg bounces against the sheets, energy desperate to escape her body any way it can. 

Her phone buzzes in her hand and she jerks to attention. _Sara Nørrstelien posted in Flawless since ‘99._

Sana’s hovers her thumb over the notification. She could put it down, turn away. She left the group. She doesn't need them. The screen dims and she presses the home button to awaken it. 

She swipes the notification open with her thumb, and brings it closer to her face, scanning the page intently. 

_the One and Only bus boss!_

_The queen is back!_

_Hallo, it wasn't me!! who's in my facebook?_

_Hehe it was me❤️_

_Vilde_. Sana presses her teeth to the inside of of bottom lip, biting until the pain makes her features scrunch. Heat burns, hot and immediate through her chest, her temples, the back of her neck. 

Sana breathes out heavily through her nose, and her hands grip the phone tighter. She wants desperately to tear her eyes away from the screen but she can't, as the messages continue rolling in. 

She sees scenes between the messages: scrubbing Vilde’s vomit out of the fabric of her favorite shirt, _I still don't get why Sana didn't want to join…_ ; the weight of her body in her arms as Sana carries her out of a party where these same girls were mocking her, _She said it was the values of russe? But she never had an issue before._

Her vision jumps, like she’s short circuiting, scanning the caption and the image over and over again.

_Probably her parents then. They must not want her to be on a bus because of all the drinking and they're Muslims. That’s a lot of temptation_

Sana’s mouth falls open when she sees it’s Sara who has the fucking _audacity_ —her fingers move across the keyboard so fast she barely makes contact with the screen, her rage blurring the letters under her hands. _It’s not because I’m muslim it's because you're a fucking FAKE B—_

She throws her phone away from her. It hits the bedspread as she pushes herself up to her feet, breath coming heavy and quick as she paces the length of the room, mind working on a loop— _I have to do something, I have to do fucking something, they can't just get away with this, they can't—_ she approaches the door to her room and rips it open, aiming to go out to the basketball court. 

Sana barely makes it a step across the threshold before she hears Elias’ laugh rising above the unintelligible yelling that hovered around the five boys like a cloud. The breath leaves her body all at once, stepping backwards back into her room and shutting it behind her with a bang.

“ _Sana?_ ” Mamma’s voice carries down the hall, and even the boys fall quiet waiting for her response.

Her whole body jolts when the _adhan_ rings out from her phone on the bed. The loud, clear voice sounds hard-edged and mocking to her ears in a way that it never has before and she needs it to _stop._ The world is suddenly all razor edges; she presses her back against the door and closes her eyes tight against the sound, paralyzed.

“ _Sana!”_ Her mother’s voice sounds closer now. Sana forces her eyes open and hurriedly cries out, “I’m fine, it’s fine!” and scrambles over to the bed to silence her phone. 

She perches on the edge of her bed, phone still open to the post, where they’ve moved on from speculating about her oppression to who was going to hook up with the hot guys from Bakka this weekend. 

The room goes still around her. 

Sana’s eyes blur staring at the light of the screen, and she blinks away the discomfort. She takes a deep, steadying breath and looks out the window, focusing on moving her mind away from the _outragepanicfear_ and into something more useful.

She comes away with different kind of anger, black and smooth. It lines her stomach, her throat, leaves her ice-cold and clear-headed. 

Her phone buzzes and Sana looks down. _Is it ok if Magnus invites the boys? He says sorry there was drama last time_ ❤️

Her thoughts make several leaps at once, _fake, fake, fake,_ before she navigates to her messages and opens her conversation with Isak. The smile that spreads across her face isn’t something she wants to look at, but damn does it feel good. 

  


* * *

  


_friday 13:05_

  


* * *

  


_friday 13:35_

  


* * *

  


_friday 16:00_

_summertime sadness_

Their tea cups sit between them on the table, steaming. Sana wraps her hands around the cup, pressing her palms to the burning porcelain until her hands get used to the heat. They both stare into the depths of their tea.

Sana catches the refrain of the song playing through the small speaker perched on top of the bed’s headboard in the corner. She lifts her head, raises her eyebrows. “This song, seriously?” 

Even’s head jerks up. His eyes drift to the speaker and he smiles, just a small upturn of the corner of his mouth. He runs the pad of his thumb over the edge of his teacup. “Don’t you get sad in the summer?” 

Sana doesn't know how to answer that, but there's so much about Even that makes him the kind of person you don't want to hurt. She doesn't want him to feel bad about being sad in the summer. It's not so different to how she’s spent her summer, mad as hell. 

So she smiles back at him, the same small gesture. It’s the first for her in a while, and she feels too exposed all at once, looking back down at her hands to hide it. 

She’s been angry for so long, almost two whole weeks without interruption. Even’s quiet softness and the nervous way his long body curls over his cup makes her feel like a wild animal trying to handle something small and breakable. She finds herself thinking, absurdly, _What do people talk about when they don't hate each other?_

“Elias listens to Lana Del Rey,” he says suddenly, and she looks up at him, eyebrows raised. 

“You think I don't know that?” Sana asks, incredulous. “He acts like our flat is soundproof. He’s been learning to play guitar, too, probably to impress that girl he thinks we don't know about.” 

Even barks out a laugh, and he has the kind of joy that travels. Sana smiles back, satisfied.

“Isabell from Bakka, still?” he inquires, eyebrows raised and mouth slack, expectant. 

Sana shrugs. “I don't have details, just the soundtrack.”

Even breathes out a laugh at that, and the tension in his body releases. He stretches back in his chair, bracing his hands behind his head, and looks out the window as a fire truck idles down the block below. She raises her cup to her lips, smile still playing around her mouth. 

*

“He made me promise, you know, right before you walked in, that I would keep my clothes on,” Even says, bringing his thumb to his mouth to lick off the last of the sticky crumbs clinging there. “And we just laughed about it. So after that, I decided to just keep a good humor about it all.”

Sana nods, smiling. They’re sprawled on the rug beside the bed, wax paper littered with the remnants of Sana’s mother’s chebakia spread between them. “You’re doing well,” she says. 

“I’m doing well,” he affirms, leaning back and propping himself up on his palms. “Just taking things day by day, minute by minute.”

Sana sits up, crossing her legs and leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees. “I’m sorry for dragging up the past, then.”

“No, no,” he says, looking out the window now. “I think — it’s like, I made it such a big deal, and built it up so much in my head.”

Sana looks at him intently, leaning forward. He looks full of life, white shirt and the late afternoon sun lighting him up. It’s hard to imagine him any other way. 

He continues, “I was trying to protect people. Or that’s what I told myself. But it doesn't work like that. People cared about me. When I pushed them away, it didn't change anything, it just hurt them.”

He lets out a long, intentional breath, lips rounded to shape the air as it passes. He looks back over at her. “Like what happened with the fight—,” he breaks off, eyebrows furrowing. 

Sana realizes she hasn't been breathing enough and takes a deep breath through her nose, sitting up straighter on the exhale. She thought she had come here to… she didn't even know, now. Snoop through Isak’s chats, and get revenge on Sara? It seems so stupid in hindsight, across from Even’s soft heart, trying so hard to do good for himself. 

It’s clear now, the way the whole room has leaned in to listen to them, from the seriousness etched into Even’s brow, that this moment is why she was brought here, _subhanallah_.

He purses his lips, looks down at his lap. “Have you ever been so sad about something, that you can’t even talk about it? And then—like, because of that, you’re upset about it for so long, for so much longer than it seems like you should be.”

Sana stares at him, her heart beating fast in her chest as it fills with the thin, anxious burn of recognition. She looks down at her lap, blinks rapidly until her heart settles. 

“And then,” he says, voice low. “by the time you can talk about it, you think it’s never the right moment to bring it up. So you just carry it around, even if you're better, you're still carrying it around. And it just gets bigger and bigger until it’s just a black cloud that you can't even get near without… I don't know. I don't know.”

He sighs, and Sana looks up at him from under her brow, chin still tucked close to her chest. “Sorry. My mind is in a million places. But what I’m trying to say is, if I just talked to Isak, or to the boys—I don't know why I was so ashamed of what happened. I still am. When I think about it, I feel like—like a fucking coward. It’s like I’m back in that place again in my mind.”

“Ugh, I’m sorry, Sana,” he breaks off suddenly, sitting up and scrubbing at his eyes. “Fun Friday, yeah? I’m glad Isak is out.” 

Sana shakes her head, quickly, emphatically. Her chest hurts, looking at him. “You don't have to apologize.”

“I’m so much better now,” Even says, meeting her eyes, gaze filled with sincerity. “But you have to know—it's not that I don't still have highs and lows. It’s as unpredictable as ever.” 

He smiles wryly before continuing, “But it’s better now because—I’m learning that it’s not wrong? It’s not something to be ashamed of, to be bipolar. It just is. I just am.” 

Sana nods, humming lowly in affirmation as she smiles at him. The gravity in the air lets up a bit, the both of them sitting in comfortable silence. She drags a finger through the last of the syrup clinging to the paper between them. 

“You talked to Isak about it, then?” Sana says, bringing her finger to her mouth and peering at him seriously. 

“I—yeah,” he says, but he fidgets uncomfortably with the fibers of the rug. “I mean—yeah. I talked to him about Mikael, and the boys, and all that. It was good. He had built it all up in his head, because I was hiding so much, that's why he got so jealous. I forget sometimes that he’s dealing with his own stuff too.”

Sana recalls yesterday in the hallway, _I’ll just go hang myself now, then!_ , and lets the silence prompt him. She thinks it's not the kind of thing to push someone to talk about.

He's quiet, fingers pulling apart the fibers of the rug absently.

After a while, she says, “That’s good.”

She takes a breath. “I’m still sorry about Elias, and the rest of them,” she says, trying to meet his eyes. “Islam isn't—I mean, _I_ don't think that Islam says there's anything wrong with being gay.”

“Huh?” Even says, head jerking up. “Oh, no—no, Sana. That—this,” he gestures widely with one hand. “That’s not what happened. They’re not… I mean, I don't have any reason to think they're homophobic, do you?” 

There’s a rattle at the door, and both of them look over in time to see it swing open to a slightly pink and smiling Isak, hair damp and curling. Even glances back at her and grins apologetically before pushing himself to his feet and going to greet Isak. 

Sana feels full of fondness as she watches the lovely, easy way that Even fills the whole room with his excitement, buzzing around Isak as he settles into their home and inquires about his day. She thinks that if anyone deserves to be this happy, it is Even and it’s made even sweeter by their conversation, how she knows now that he has fought for this, fights for it every day of his life. 

“Sana-sol!” Isak greets her cheerily. “You spilled all of my secrets then?”

She rolls her eyes, but smiles, something small. She looks at Even over Isak’s shoulder as she says, “No, I decided it’s up to you what to share about your past.”

Isak grins, dropping into a chair to untie his shoes. “You’re a good person, Sana.”

Sana feels taken aback, thinks about what she came here to do and stays quiet.

“I agree,” Even chimes in, dropping a kiss to the top of Isak’s head. “Only a saint would bring chebakia and listen to a lame old man like me whine on a Friday afternoon.”

“Huh?” Isak says, looking around. “There were sweets? And no one saved me any?”

Sana raises her eyebrows at him. “That's what you get for swimming instead of studying.” She glances at her phone for the time and gets up, grabbing her notebook out of her backpack as she joins him at the table. “Speaking of, I have to leave in an hour, so if you want any chance of passing this test, you better sit down and listen to me.”

Isak sighs, a long suffering thing and opens his notes. He opens his laptop, and squints at the time. “Even, don't you have to be at work?”

Even swears under his breath, glancing down at his watch from where he'd been leaning casually against the wall and watching them with amusement. Isak rolls his eyes as Even shifts into a flurry of movement, grabbing jacket and keys. 

“Playtime is _over_ ,” he says, flipping to the middle of their Biology textbook with a thump. 

Sana has felt very tired for a long time, as long as she can remember, her mind full of memories, words, feelings, spread across too many eras, and cultures, and people.

But she finds the energy to laugh now. It’s something about Isak’s put upon misery, and Even, still fighting for the smile on his face, and a sudden closeness with a power that feels like _light,_ like _love_ , that draws it out of her. It’s a loud, clear sound, and it feels like coming up for air. 

“Yeah. Let’s go, bitches.”


	2. episode 7

_saturday 14:52_

_wife materiał_

Sana stares hard at her phone screen, open to a blank message to Jamilla Bikarim. It’s hot, and she’s hungry, and there’s little that Sana hates more than being reminded of times that she was wrong. 

_Hi. Ghali said we’re seeing you both tonight so in the spirit of Ramadan, I wanted_

It’s so lame. There’s nothing she can say to fix what’s been done, Sana knows that better than anyone. She erases the message, and locks her phone, staring at the ceiling instead. Voices filter in through the open doors of her balcony, and she closes her eyes. 

Sana wants desperately for the boys to leave, so she can take off her hijab and suffer in peace. She thinks about texting Elias to get them to go away, but decides against it. She doesn't want him to think that everything is fine between them, because it's not. Whatever Even said still doesn't explain—

She clenches her eyes shut tighter. Her mind feels like a minefield lately, and it takes a careful dance to keep her moving forward, functioning enough to keep the questions at bay for a little longer. It's an unsustainable system; there are too many mines and too much distance to go each day. 

Her phone chimes, but she doesn't move to answer. It's been like this all day, all week, all month: her mind racing at a thousand thoughts per minute, picking through all of the unanswered questions, the unsanitized hurts of the last few weeks, then retreating to a dark, hostile quiet. 

She used to seek out quiet in prayer, the way the immensity of her god held her safely in place amongst creation. But lately, when her thoughts stop spinning, her mind levels into a smooth, exhausting darkness that tells her that she is _not enough, has never been enough, will never be enough_ and the way it echoes back at her feels like the truth. It’s the kind of dark that curls through your lungs like an invisible gas, filling you up and strangling you before anyone is the wiser. 

She exhales. Yesterday was nice though, with Even, and later with her family. She tries to remember that. A pang of hunger roils through her stomach, and it reminds her of her capacity to do better. She forces her eyes open, out of the darkness. 

She breathes in and her mind starts on a familiar loop. Sana knows that Noora loves her. She thinks, she wouldn’t have done it if she’d known. She thinks, it’s not Noora’s fault. She thinks, Noora was emotional over William, and it was a one time thing. It’s so easy to absolve Noora, sweet Noora, who has already endured so much.

Then, she thinks, feeling optimistic for a moment, there’s no way that she had made up what was between herself and Yousef. She thinks, there’s no way that she could have been that stupid. She unlocks her phone. 

_Sana? It’s been so long since we’ve hung out. I know you're busy, but do you think you have some time? I have some good news, too❤️_

“Where is Yousef?”she hears Elias ask from the grass below her balcony. 

“Uh–,” That’s Adam, voice breaking off to laugh. They’re all laughing. 

_He’s with Noora, isn’t he?_

When she was ten years old, she was best friends with a pretty, blonde girl named Elle. Sana asked if she wanted to play after school, and they would go to Elle’s house and play with dolls that looked so much like Elle and nothing like Sana. Her mother would make them soft, beige foods with raw carrots chopped into neat sticks, celery lined with peanut butter and sprinkled with raisins. Elle’s mother always told her to make herself at home, that she was welcome any time, that they loved having her over to visit, and Elle would say the same while they played, parroting the genteel mannerisms of her moneyed white home. 

_They have a thing! I saw them chatting._

_What? Sana’s friend, Noora? That Noora?_

_Yeah, bro. They’ve been talking. Are you jealous?_

They lost contact after primary school, and it was a few years before Sana saw her again, pushing a cart down the aisle at the shops, bored and dragged along by her mother, same as Sana. Sana had raised her hand in excited greeting, and Elle had averted her eyes. It was then, her mind carding through memories of her youth with the lens of an adolescent, that she realized that Elle had been friends with her because she was too polite not to be. 

It’s like her whole field of vision shifts, and she gets that same sense that she’d got in that grocery aisle, hiding behind the bathroom door at SYNG, standing in the crowd and watching Noora’s hands card through the hair at the base of Yousef’s neck–like she’s watching herself from the outside with a horrified sort of humiliation.

_What? That’s–that’s fucking weak._ Elias’ words seem to grab at her insides and twist. They break something, a hysterical, soft sob ripping its way out of her body. She feels awful, disgusting, dizzily disassociated with her sense of self for ignoring him for so long, for believing Yousef over what she _knows_ about her brother. 

_You’re jealous, bro! You’re jealous!_

There’s nothing that she could have done to make this moment easier, or better. Her limbs aren’t working right. She wants to cover her ears, she doesn’t want to hear any more.

_She’s so cute. She’s wife material, for sure._

She remembers, abruptly, her own words from ages ago: _They fuck around with Norwegians girls and then leave them on the curb when they’re ready to settle down._ Sana laughs, a horrific, ugly sound, no humor in it at all, and she slaps a hand over her mouth as she sits up. 

The laugh turns into a sob that wracks through her whole body, the pain of the last month shredding through her chest, and it’s the kind of cry that feels like it will never, ever stop, every time she calms for a moment her mind lands on a new, horrifyingly embarrassing misstep, a stupid, stupid fucking assumption. 

Noora, at the windowsill, _You're being a bit paranoid, I think?_

Her grade eight guidance counselor, across the desk as Sana prods miserably at a bruise on her wrist, It was a pretty extreme reaction, _Sana, have you ever thought that maybe you have trouble managing your emotions?_

Vilde, in the cabin, _You don't have to wear it in here, you know? Since it’s just us girls?_

Sara, in the courtyard: _I think the buses need to merge a bit more, don’t you?_

A white woman on the street, touching her gently on the arm, _Do you need help, sweetheart?,_ voice low and eyes darting over to Elias.

Yousef in the kitchen, after her first day of high school, smiling at her and asking about her day. 

Every Saturday morning before the rest of the squad came along, teaming up against Elias and Ghali in pickup footie in the backyard. Yousef insisting that they’re a team because she's so much better than Elias at sports. 

High fives that end with their fingers tangled together, eyes smiling like she’s the only thing in the world. 

His elbows propped up on the coffee table while he waits for Elias to finish fussing with his outfit so they can go out, messing up Sana’s carefully laid out notes. _Tell me what you’re studying, Sana. You can make anything sound interesting. Look, go on then, tell me about quadratic equations._

His goofy, amazed noises as she recites the mnemonic to solve them, and both of their laughs as he insists, _see, see, I told you, everything out of your mouth is fascinating._

His face, lit up orange and gold under the streetlamps, her heart, as full as it's ever been, maybe the most it's ever been. 

_Are you looking into my eyes now?_

_I’m looking! I’m looking into your eyes._

It's like the hurt runs out of fuel, and she quiets, all at once. It gathers in the base of her stomach and fills, like a sink that won't drain, pooling everything that she’s tried to wash away, turning soap to grime.

Sana lays back against her bed. The adhan sounds for _Asr._ She lets the call sound for a minute, two minutes. She silences it with no intention of prayer. 

* * *

_saturday 22:43_

_ramadan_

Her mother is calling from the kitchen.

Sana’s body feels hot, aching from lack of movement, food, and hydration. There is nothing she wants less than to get up and sit around a table with her family, Jamilla, and the boys. 

She is so tired.

She sits up, stares at Tupac Shakur. Exhales. She remembers Even taking things minute by minute, and she takes a breath in. This minute, she stands up, peers at herself in the mirror of her vanity. Her skin is mottled red, face swollen, eyes greyed with mascara long since rubbed away.

The next minute, she goes to wash. She can’t stand that evidence of her own stupidity is written across her face. She turns the water on as hot as she can stand it and washes her face, once, twice, three times. She washes like she’s performing wudu, meticulous, ritualistic.

There’s a knock at the door, and Sana checks her reflection in the mirror. She looks tired, but clean. She is red along the edges, if you’re looking for it. She pins her hijab back around her head quickly, hopes that it will hide the rest. 

When she opens the door, Jamilla stares back at her, all glowing brown skin and soft purple fabric, and Sana’s mouth goes dry. 

“Hi Sana,” Jamilla says, voice low. She tilts her head, and Sana snaps her mouth shut where it’s gone slack. 

“Hi,” Sana says, putting a hand on the door jam, then moving it to rest on her hip, and then pressing it flat against her leg. She has never known what to do with her hands around Jamilla, who is so full of easy grace compared to the people around her that Sana has always thought that it must feed off of everyone else’s, a carnivorous beauty. 

“We’re waiting for you to eat,” she says, simply. Jamilla’s fingers come up to adjust where Sana’s hastily pinned hijab meets the skin of her forehead, thumb tracing along the edge once it’s in place. Sana has never been so aware of her forehead. “Are you ready?”

Jamilla turns without waiting for her answer. It doesn’t feel like a truce, or forgiveness. It’s simply a forward momentum that Sana is incapable of resisting, finding herself turning off the light, and following close behind Jamilla before even making the decision to move, close enough to smell the lingering waft of her perfume, warm and expensive. 

*

Jamilla and Sana sit on the swings in the backyard, passing a large fry from Macca’s between them. The air is quiet and warm around them, and Sana breathes in deeply, exhaling fully. 

“Bis-mil- _lah_ ,” Sana says emphatically, biting into a fry and humming with content. 

Jamilla makes a noise in agreement, leaning over and snagging her own fry from the carton. It’s nearing 2 am, but they had both opted out of more practical meals for suhoor for the greasy, salty satisfaction of the fries. 

It’s quiet again, and pushes herself a bit with the tip of her sneaker into the ground. She recalls the night in a wash of light, laughter, and warmth. The darkness of the late afternoon feels like something out of another life, her body flush with good food and golden energy.

The sudden force of her gratitude makes tears well in her eyes again, tears made of completely different stuff, made of her family, her god, and made of _her_ , flawed and growing and beautiful all the same. She blinks rapidly to clear them away. 

“Are you okay?” Jamilla asks, nudging Sana with the tip of her boot. 

“Mmm,” she hums. It’s not a confirmation or a denial, and she doesn’t look up at her, busying her hands with another bite. 

Jamilla doesn’t say anything, but her gaze stays steady on Sana, solid, patient. 

Sana looks over, and then back down at her lap. She shakes her head, just a sharp, quick gesture. She doesn’t even mean to do it, but once it’s done, it’s done. Jamilla doesn’t acknowledge it, just blinks, her lush eyelashes making the movement heavy and deliberate.

It’s enough. The words follow quickly after, like she’s draining a wound: one thing, _they literally plotted how to steal the bus and kick me off like what is this, racist, low-budget gossip girl?,_ after another, _and then elias broke my biology partner’s nose,_ after another, _and do you remember even?_

She ends with Yousef, her voice low and clinical as she says, “And when I came back, he was kissing Noora. And now they’re hanging out.”

After a moment, Sana opens her mouth, before thinking better of it. But then, unable to stop herself, she adds, “Dating. They’re fucking dating. What the fuck!”

“Astaghfirullah,” she adds in a mumble, slouching. She shoves another fry into her mouth and chews emphatically.

Jamilla peers at her thoughtfully. “So, what?”

Sana’s head snaps up, eyes narrowed. “What?”

Jamilla sighs. “What’s the point in being mad about it? He showed you that he’s a fuckboy. Cry a little, and then be happy that you found out early, and move on.”

“You don’t think there’s anything more to figure out?” Sana asks, and immediately wants to slap herself. “Oh my god. It’s happening to me.”

“Huh?” Jamilla raises an eyebrow with muted interest. 

Sana shakes her head, bemused and suddenly clear-headed. “I swear, my friends spend all of their time trying to excuse the shitty behavior of the guys they like,” she says. “And I tell them to take them at their word. If they’re being shitty, it’s because they’re shitty. But here I am. Doing the same thing.”

Jamilla shrugs, leaning over to take another fry. “Patriarchy.”

Sana raises her eyebrows and pulls the corners of her mouth down in an impressed smirk, peering at Jamilla with a slight tilt of her head.

They eat in silence for a moment, swings swaying out of sync. 

“But what about Noora?” Sana asks, grounding her toe into the ground. The swing jolts from side to side. “The other girls?”

Jamilla shrugs again. “I don’t trust white girls,” she says, simply. “I’ve never had a white girl be there for me over one of her own. I’m not the person to ask.”

Sana used to feel alienated when Jamilla said things like that about white girls, but she finds that she understands where she’s coming from now. Sana can’t decide if that’s growth or not. 

“Do you feel better now?” Jamilla asks, tipping her head in Sana’s direction, gaze following slowly. She is so pretty, backlit by the streetlights. Sana always thought that she wanted to _be_ Jamilla, but she reflects on the easy, steady warmth that she feels around her now and thinks that this is just as good.

Sana takes stock of herself, the way her heart feels lighter, how the truths of her life feel soft enough to hold in her hands instead of all razor edges. It’s not that she feels _well_ about it all, but the hurt and pain has ripened into something a bit more caustic, easier to carry around, dulled. 

Sana nods, first just to herself, and then over at Jamilla, smile small and intimate between them. “Thank you.”

Jamilla nods back, short and satisfied. She pushes up off the swings. “That’s what sisters are for,” she says. “To keep it real about fuckboys and white girls.”

Sana’s stomach does an odd little twist in response to any of it, all of it. Jamilla extends a hand to Sana, and she takes it, pulling herself up using Jamilla’s weight as a counter. Her hand is warm and dry, just a little bigger than Sana’s own. 

* * *

_monday 15:45_

_[no scrubs](https://vimeo.com/224122121) _

Sana smirks as she sinks the shot and catches the rebound, throwing the ball at Yousef’s chest with just a bit too much aggression to be friendly. Her heart is pounding in her chest, running fast on anger and adrenaline and the irritating, addicting weight of Yousef’s attention. 

The door to their building opens and Elias steps out, face stormy. 

“You said you were going home, bro,” Elias calls across the courtyard forcefully, and Sana takes two hurried steps backwards. 

Yousef lifts his cap and pushes a hand through his hair, looking nervous. “Yeah, I was just showing Sana how to shoot a three properly,” he says in a weak attempt at humor, the smile dying off of his face as Elias gets closer. 

“She’s been better than you at ball since she was 12,” Elias says, voice a cruel edge. He grabs the ball from Yousef and steps between them. 

“Elias—,” Sana starts, reaching up to touch his shoulder. He shrugs her off, but turns and hands her the ball. 

“Do you want to play with him, Sana?” he asks, his gaze serious. Her eyes shift to Yousef, looking small and guilty, then back to Elias, rolling the ball between her hands.

“No,” she says, finally. It’s not true, not totally, but it’s a sadistic sort of pleasure to watch the words hit Yousef almost bodily, his face closing off and the line of his shoulders tensing. “I was playing alone.”

Elias nods, satisfied. “You heard her,” he says, gesturing with his chin towards the door. “Later, bro.”

Yousef presses his lips together, chewing at the corner for a moment, regarding them. Elias raises his eyebrows, crosses his arms. 

“Okay,” he says, at length. He looks at Sana, and she sees _hurt_ there, which makes anger flare in her stomach, sudden and hot. “Sorry for bothering you, Sana.” 

He turns to leave and Elias, looking at her and then at Yousef’s retreating back, calls after him, “We’ll chat later.”

Yousef looks over his shoulder, nods. It’s so stupid and moody that Sana rolls her eyes, dribbles the ball with too much force and turns towards the basket. 

“Sana?”

Sana pauses, hands lifted in preparation for her layup. She lowers them slowly, tucking the ball against her side and turning to face her brother. 

He shifts his weight from side to side. “Do you still want to play alone?” 

Sana takes him in, the relaxed line of his shoulders and friendly, smiling eyes, like he didn’t just dismiss his best friend on her behalf, like she hasn’t been icing him out for weeks. 

Sana doesn’t deserve his earnest heart. She shakes her head, passes him the ball. His smile is immediate and bright when he catches it, jumping up into a shot. 

“ _Ballin’!_ ” he calls, hand curved around his mouth like a megaphone. The balls whirrs through the air just outside of the hoop, bouncing once and landing in the grass beside the court. “Oh. Shit.”

Sana laughs, jogging over to retrieve the ball. “Should I call for mamma to give you some pointers?”

* * *

_tuesday 19:10 - 20:12_

* * *

_tuesday 19:21_

* * *

_wednesday 11:15_

* * *

_wednesday 13:46_

* * *

_wednesday 13:55_

_no people like the arab people_

“Seriously, not even water?” Sara asks, tilting her head. 

She looks to her right at the girls, Eva, Vilde, and Chris, all standing close to one another across from Sara and Ingrid. She doesn’t know what she’s looking for on their faces, but she comes away disappointed.

She wonders what it would be like to be so completely rotten in the soul that she could wage a plot to screw someone over and stand there smiling, feigning interest in a religion that she clearly finds distasteful at best.

_A'udhu Billahi min ash-shaytaan-i'r rajeem._ Sana’s eyes blur in her effort not to roll them. 

“Not even water,” Sana says, flatly. She walks back through all of the choices that she made that day that brought her to this very moment, regretting each and every one of them.

Ingrid and Sara are quiet, clearly having exhausted their knowledge of what Ramadan entails. Vilde brings her hand to her mouth to chew on the cuticle of her thumb. Eva glances between them. 

“If you get hangry, you can take it out on me, Sana,” Chris says, breaking the silence. She reaches over Vilde and offers her hand. Sana smiles, deliberately directing it only at Chris, and slaps her palm. 

“You’re tough, huh?” Sana says, and Chris puffs up with mock-pride. Her phone buzzes in her pocket and she takes it out. 

_Pulling up now, come out_

The low thrum of a bassline makes Sana look up, and she sees Ghali’s shiny, black Ampera at the curb. She always thought his fixation on the car was stupid, didn’t understand what the wing on the back was for, or why he was so hype about _lowering the profile_ of the body. But she quite appreciates it now, glancing up and seeing all five of the girls staring unabashedly at the car. 

Looking at the identical weak smiles that do nothing to hide the blatant discomfort on Ingrid, Sara, and Vilde’s faces feels like cool water down the throat and she smirks. Her stomach clenches in satisfaction as their eyebrows raise almost as one as Jamilla rolls down the window, dark and beautiful and as intimidating as ever. 

“Let’s roll,” she calls, somehow raising her voice above the bumping Arabic rap blaring from the speakers without breaking her soft, deadpan delivery. 

“Is that the Hijab Police?” Chris says incredulously, and Sana shoots her a sharp look. 

“Don’t call her that,” Sana snaps. 

Chris recoils a little, and mumbles an apology. Sana softens immediately, regret pooling in her stomach, feeling confused and turned around. 

“Sorry,” she reverses, touching Chris on the shoulder gently. “I shouldn’t have called them that in the first place.”

The furrow between her brow stays, but Chris nods, mollified. “Cool car, though.”

“See you later,” Sana says, waving as she turns to go, but Eva catches her wrist before she steps away.

“You’re still coming Friday, right?” Eva asks, gaze on Jamilla before meeting Sana’s eyes hopefully. 

“I just said in the chat, yeah,” Sana says, furrowing her eyebrows. She looks at the worry lining Eva’s face, eyes darting to Chris’ similar expression. “What?”

“You’ve just been different lately?” Eva offers, hesitantly. At Sana’s expression, she shakes her head, releasing her wrist hurriedly. “Nevermind, I’m being totally weird. See you tomorrow, then.”

Sana nods slowly, and waves her goodbyes. Eva’s expression stays worried as she turns away, and Sana feels their eyes at her back as she retreats, shrugging her backpack over her shoulder. She catches the lyrics of the song as she lowers herself into the passenger’s seat.

_من يوم ما خلقت و سيدي والشعب مسؤوليتي From the day I was created, my people are my responsibility. هيك انا تربّيت بين الشرق والغرب That's how I was brought up - between the West and East, بين لغتين بين البخيل و بين الفقير between two languages, between the rich and the poor. شُفت الحياة من الشكتين I saw life from both sides._

“Did you do that on purpose?” Sana asks, pointing at the stereo.

Jamilla smirks, and shrugs. “Loser white guys aren’t the only people who deserve dramatic entrances.”

Sana stares blankly at her for a moment, before barking out a laugh, carefree and simple, pulling her safety belt across her chest.

Jamilla puts on the gas, tearing down the street. She glances at Sana, and then back to the road, smiling idly. “I thought they were going to piss themselves, honestly.” 

Sana laughs again, letting it fill her up with light, draping her arm along the open window. The wind pushes up the sleeves of her blazer, whips around the fabric of her scarf, joyous.

_ما في بعض مثل الشعب العربي_

_There is no group like the Arab people._

Sana catches sight of herself in the side mirror, unapologetically brown and luminous and powerful. _Beautiful, maybe,_ she thinks.

She sends her praises to the highest, closing her eyes. The feeling of the wind against her face carries her forward, flying.

* * *

_friday 13:10_

* * *

_friday 20:21_

_happy birthday, eva_

Sana checks her phone again, _two minutes_ , and a message from Jamilla. 

_We missed you at Friday prayers_

Sana realizes with a low, hollow feeling in her stomach that she would have much rather been at Friday prayers, rather than here. She feels awful about it, because it’s Eva’s birthday and they’re supposed to be best friends, but there’s so much between them now, and really, there’s been so much between them for so long. She wonders how long she’s felt this way without knowing what to call it.

“Do you remember the ouija board?” Eva says, head in Vilde’s lap on the couch in Eva’s room. Vilde cards her fingers through her hair contentedly, sipping wine with her other hand. 

“Fucking hell,” Chris exclaims from where she's sprawled on her back on the rug. “I forgot all about that. The ghosts knew Isak was gay!”

Noora rolls her eyes, locks her phone and sets it aside. Sana eyes it, wonders if she was texting Yousef before she can stop herself, remind herself that she doesn’t care anymore. “Eva and I knew he was gay,” she says. “That stuff is all subconscious signaling. We probably did it without realizing.”

“You were cheating!” Vilde says, bracing herself on her hands to sit up straighter. Eva jostles in her lap and Vilde replaces her hand, soothing. “You had all the answers already.”

“You knew about William, obviously,” she says, and Sana sees that glint of intelligence that Vilde tries hard to hide peek out, sharp and calculating. It shutters as quickly as it appeared as she continues, “So, Sana—”

“I’m not psychic, Vilde,” Sana replies tiredly. “Eva, can I get water?” 

“Huh?” Eva startles. “In the kitchen, yeah. Do you need me to come?” 

“No thanks.” Sana pushes herself up off of the floor and walks upstairs. Eva’s home is all modern lines and glinting glass surfaces. Sana doesn’t like to touch anything, because she leaves fingerprints that she has to rub off with the edge of her scarf. 

She gets to the kitchen and fills one very shiny glass with water, tossing it back and filling it again. It’s quiet up here, none of the sounds from Eva’s room making it up the stairs. It’s quite anticlimactic breaking the fast alone, after the last week of loud, family dinners and chatty, silly meals with Jamilla and her friends from uni. She leans against the counter, fills her glass for a third time. 

When she returns downstairs, Chris sits up. “Can you eat now? We made sure this pizza was halal!”

Sana stops in the doorway. Her heart goes very soft, very quickly. She nods, smiling, hopeful for the first time in a while. 

*

Later, they are full of pizza, warm and sated, all tangled together on Eva’s bed. Sana feels quite sure that this is the moment, that they aren’t going to get any closer to how they were before unless she says something. 

Sana takes a deep breath.

“Is this the moment?” Eva says, sleepy and drunk beside her. “Hold on, I can be more awake than this.”

“Huh?” Sana squints at her from the corner of her eye, confused. “What moment?”

“Noora?” Eva whispers, but her drunken whisper is only just below a shout. 

“What about Noora?” Vilde pipes up, blinking widely at them from where she’s curled up tightly on her side. 

Noora yawns, lipstick gone, head pillowed on Eva’s side. “What about me?”

It’s a stupid question, because she must know, having spent her whole life as herself, that despite everyone’s best efforts, _everything_ is about her. Sana tries very hard not to be annoyed.

“Not about that,” Sana says.

Eva yawns back. “Okay, you first, then.”

Sana takes another deep breath. “You know how I left the bus?”

Eva comes awake more fully at that, turning to look at her and disrupting Noora’s resting place, and the rest of the girls make similar adjustments, leaning towards her like plants to afternoon light. Sana isn’t ready for the intensity of all of their gazes all at once. She’d clearly underestimated how curious they were about it. 

She takes another breath, and continues. “It’s not because of russe values, or whatever,” she says slowly, toying with the edge of her hijab. “At SYNG, that night with the fight and everything, I found out Sara and the other girls were plotting to kick me off the bus. So I left before they could.”

No one says anything aloud, but Sana sees them slowly make a network of eye contact, exchanging non-verbal sentiments that they think she can’t handle. 

“What?” she asks sharply, sitting up. She looks at each of their faces, painted with hesitation and anxiety. 

It’s Vilde who speaks for them. She’s always found her bravery at the worst times. 

“Sana,” she starts, her voice gentle in a condescending way. “Why would they do that? When they’ve been really nice and welcoming to us this whole time, even when… _we’ve_ not been the nicest to them?”

She says _we_ and means _you._

Sana narrows her eyes. “You don’t believe me.”

Eva jumps in, sitting up hurriedly. “No, that’s not it, seriously,” she says, shaking her head. “I think Vilde just means it doesn’t make sense why they would only kick you off? They know that if they did something like that, we would leave too! Are you sure it’s not a misunderstanding?”

Sana looks at Chris, who is steadfastly avoiding her eyes. She doesn’t look at Noora, because looking at Noora is already painful, already horrible enough without being betrayed on this front too. _This was a test. You are paranoid._

Vilde speaks up again, though Sana wishes she wouldn’t. “I agree with Eva. Maybe you misunderstood what they meant? Where did you hear it from, anyway?”

“I heard some girls talking while I was in the bathroom,” Sana says, frustrated. This was exactly why she hadn’t said anything before now, and it’s even more nightmarish to have it play out in front of her, like a mockery of her own hopefulness. _I’ve never had a white girl choose me over one of her own_. “They said they didn’t want to be around when I found out I wasn’t on the bus anymore. Sara signed the contract with Mari without me.”

They’re quiet, but Sana can tell they are largely unconvinced. Desperate, she looks at Noora for support. 

“Don’t look at me!” Noora says, rolling onto her back. “You know I’ve never cared about the russe stuff. I’m glad to be out.”

Sana furrows her eyebrows, and feels anger light up in her chest. Of _course_ since Noora doesn’t care about it, it’s not important, it’s not a serious problem. She’s never had to care about it, she could have been on any bus, loved by anyone, everyone. _Especially Noora! She’s so pretty!_

“That’s nice for you then, Noora!” Sana says, before she can help herself. She looks to the rest of them, and their soft, placating looks make her want to ruin things. 

“They called me a psycho, but I’m sure I’m misunderstanding, yeah!” Sana says, climbing off the bed inelegantly. “And they said a bunch of fucked up things about Elias, thanks for telling them he called me a _slave,_ Vilde, by the way. I’m really touched that you were so concerned about my well-being that you told the _Pepsi-max_ girls about it. Were you planning to emancipate me this week or next?”

Vilde has the decency to look ashamed, ducking her head. Chris’ eyes dart between them all on a loop. Eva stands too, following her up. “Wait, where are you going?”

“I’m going home,” Sana says, grabbing her bag. “And while I’m gone, you guys should break out the ouija board again and ask Noora some questions, since that’s the only way she knows how to tell people the truth!”

“Huh?” Noora says, rolling over to peer up at Sana. Sana stares at her, her lovely, sweet, clear face painted with confusion. Sana is overwhelmed with the realization that no one, in her entire life, will ever look on her with the innocence and care that the whole world affords Noora effortlessly. 

“Happy birthday, Eva,” Sana says, eyes hard, voice hard. 

She turns then, leaving them staring at her back, watching her leave. 


	3. episode 8

_saturday june 3, 11:05_

_you’re right_

Sana wakes with a start. The dread sets in soon after, as the sounds of the boys’ chaos filter in from the living room and the memory of the night before returns to her. She rubs her eyes, untying her hair with one hand and letting it fall across the pillow under her head, halfheartedly attempting to pull her fingers through the tangled curls. 

She reaches for her phone, squinting at the bright, white light when it comes awake. 

_Call me!!!!_

_Seriously!!!!_

She doesn’t think there’s anything she wants to do less than call Noora. Her eyes roll to the ceiling, and she lowers her phone to her chest, pressing it there. 

After a moment, she lifts it to her face again and opens a message to Elias. 

_Can you go somewhere else_

_I can’t be bothered right now_

He responds, _Princess Sana_

She rolls her eyes. _So?_

She’s being petty about it all, but it feels so nice to throw her attitude around knowing that other people know they’re wrong, _finally_. Everyone is still mad and things are fucked up, but it’s so much nicer this way, where Yousef skulks around like she can set fire to him by looking at him, and Noora begging her to call.

She stares at her phone, waiting for a typing bubble to appear. She gives up after about a minute, closing her eyes and gathering willpower to face the day. She propels herself out of bed and grabs the scarf draped over her desk chair. She wraps it half-heartedly, suddenly hopeful that she can make it to the bathroom and back without seeing the boys. 

She opens the door to her room with one hand, scrolling through instagram idly with the other. 

“Sana,” Yousef says. 

Her head snaps up, and her mouth goes slack, dry. Her awareness of herself spikes immediately, uncomfortably. She adjusts her grip on the door handle to keep her hands from tugging at the line of her scarf, which is undoubtedly bunching unattractively around her ears and the low, messy bun that she had thrown her hair into. She wants desperately to slam the door and retreat back into her room. 

It is so funny that she thought that she was over it all, she thinks, a little hysterically now. He’s got the same gaunt, frightened look that’s been hanging around him for the past few weeks, sweet and sad, hands tucked into the pockets of his joggers, and her heart is beating so fast she can feel it in her wrists. 

“What do you want?” she says, but it’s too sharp for the amount of face-to-face conflict that they’ve actually had. She tries for something more casual, releasing the door and taking a step back. “I mean. Do you need something?”

She rests her hand on the door jam, then on her hip. 

“Er,” he says, running a hand through his stupid fucking hair. She tracks the movement, and then past Yousef down what she can see of the hallway.

She wills someone to walk by so she can escape, but the flat is quiet. _La hawla wala quwata illa billah_ , she probably still has sleep in her eyes, _honestly_.

“Elias said we should talk,” he tries, bringing a hand up to rub the back of his neck. “Noora too? I was going to knock – like, I wasn’t just waiting here to scare you.”

It seems deeply unjust that this is how the conversation is happening. She had tanked hours of her life composing messages to him detailing why everything was _not okay_ between them, imagining the perfect confrontation where she would scream and probably throw something and then drop her voice and whisper all dangerously until he never even _thought_ about behaving like this ever again.

The reality is: she’s in a sweatsuit and her scarf is making her look like a mumps patient, and she feels nervous and unsure, sweating. One part of her mind runs on a loop justifying his actions until it seems ridiculous to yell, while another piece of her goes dark red and angry with rage, softening and sharpening at once.

“Yeah, um,” she says, looking at the ground, and then looking back up at him. 

It’s too bright out for the kind of drama that she feels she deserves out of this. This is the kind of scene that's supposed to play out on a dark, rainy night, where she can cry and scream and kick water across the street. Her mother shouldn’t be in the kitchen chopping vegetables, the sun filling up the apartment like anyone is meant to be having a good time.

He’s just staring at her, clearly sad and nervous, too, like he thinks he has a right to be. His eyes are soft, hesitant. He shifts his weight from foot to foot and opens his mouth to say something.

Urgently, she realizes that she can’t stand the thought of dignifying anything he has to say for himself, even if that’s unfair and childish and counterproductive. She is tired down to her fucking bones of listening to excuses for why people treat her like shit. 

“It’s okay,” she cuts him off, hurriedly. “It’s really okay. We’re cool, okay? There’s nothing to talk about.”

It’s pity on his face, she registers. Her ears are ringing, faintly, in the uncharacteristic silence of the house.

“Sana,” he says, again. “I really have to explain–everything has gotten so mixed up, and I know that I hurt you, I think–”

Something in her snaps and she puffs up, anger clouding around her head, making her lightheaded and out of control. “You didn’t hurt me, who said that you hurt me?”

“I mean–I just thought,” he starts, eyebrows furrowing. “I don’t know–sorry. This isn’t coming out how I wanted it to. It’s getting all mixed up again.”

It’s all ridiculous, so ridiculous that she struggles to put it all in line in her mind. She _cannot believe_ that he gets to be soft, and sorry. She can’t believe she’s supposed to let him talk, and when he’s done, she’s supposed to leave herself full of rage that his apologies render _inappropriate_ , _unjustified_.

“Don’t apologize to me,” she says, voice even, head spinning. “Okay? Don’t try to make it okay. I’m mad. I deserve to be mad.”

She takes a breath, puts her phone in her pocket and presses her palms against the top of her thighs to dry them. “Can I go now? Or you–can you go now?”

“Okay,” he says, retreating. “Okay.”

He seems to think better of it, shifting his weight to his toes instead of doing what she's asked. Earnest. Unassuming. “I just–I didn’t know what was going on. You blocked me on Facebook, and I was hurt too, you know?”

“And so the solution was to start dating my best friend?” she retorts, voice cruel. 

“No, no—there's nothing between us, I don't know how you even got that idea,” he says, quickly, putting his hands up like surrender. 

“You don't know where I got the idea,” she says, and she’s not yelling, she’s not, but her voice takes on an elevated, incredulous note, her whole body vibrating with thinly held restraint. Her mind catches on the new information, tilts her world on an edge. She can't process it and have this conversation at the same time. She needs him to leave, she needs space to think. 

“Look, it’s fine the way it is, just leave it alone. It’s fine that I’m mad at you, it’s fine that you deserve it,” she babbles, just trying to get to a point where she can dismiss him properly. 

“ _Deserve_ it?” Yousef says, a note of incredulity seeping into his voice. “That’s a bit much? I apologized already, and you ignored me, don’t you remember?” 

“Stop asking me questions like that, like– like I have to _agree_ ,” she snaps, indignant. “It’s not obvious, the answers to this aren’t obvious. No one gets to be _right_ about it.”

“Except for you,” he says, raising his eyebrows. 

Something under her skin ignites, his break in civility satisfying an itch she didn’t know she was seeking. She wants him to fuck up even more, provoke him into rage, like she always seems to be. It scares her with the force of it. 

“Seriously?” she says, wild with it. She takes a step closer. Things are escalating so quickly, it doesn’t seem to be within her control. “I don’t just _get_ to be right about anything! No one ever believes what I say straight out, I always have to justify it. Can you imagine how tiring that is?” 

“I get to be right because I work at it, I do my research, and I ask questions, and–” she pauses. “And when I’m wrong, I admit it. I hate it more than anything in the world, being wrong, but I admit it when I am.”

“Okay, Sana,” he says gently, soothingly, like she’s something wild to be contained, and it makes her want to lash out. 

He looks at a loss, desperate to make whatever he broke in her piece back together. 

“Okay. Look. All I wanted to tell you, what I’ve been trying to say this whole time, is that,” he pauses, an unnecessarily dramatic moment for an anticlimactic admission, two, three, four weeks too late. “I like you.”

Sana immediately hates the thrill that she feels, bright and hot in her stomach, even after everything. It outshines the anger for one completely unrealistic moment. 

Yousef looks at her then, hopeful, hair falling into his eyes. He looks at her like he has for almost as long as she can remember, an intoxicatingly steadfast gaze, like she's the only thing he's ever wanted to see. 

Sana hates the _tenderness_ that she feels for him, almost sick with it. She has never wanted to be this soft, she has never wanted to give this much of herself to anyone. It’s completely horrible that she can’t make it go away, that she just has to _live_ like this. 

She has to go on being angry and tender at the same time until he does _better_ , stops hurting her so badly every moment. She’ll just have to go on: her care for him, unavoidable and unrelentless, disrupting her care for herself. 

Sana comes back to herself then, jerked back into her head. She tells herself firmly that it doesn’t mean anything, it doesn't make anything better at all.

“That’s even _worse_ ,” Sana says emphatically, trying very hard not to shout. “If you like me, why would you leave me to break up a fight by myself? Why would you kiss my best friend? Why would you lie to me, and wait until _Elias_ blew up at you to apologize to me? When _obviously_ I felt bad, _obviously_ something was wrong?”

She’s spent her whole life dismissing her feelings, but they’ve never left, not really. They just dug their nails into her nerves, dissolved her capacity for kindness, left her cold, and mean, and alone.

Sana isn’t like that anymore. She told the girls the truth yesterday, even if they didn’t believe her. She is building her relationships with other Muslim women, other brown women who know how this world treats her sometimes. She loves herself more now, she loves herself enough to put herself first, to defend her own truth. 

“I was sad, I didn’t want to make it worse, I didn’t know–,” he starts, eyebrows furrowing together.

“Then _ask_ , you’re allowed to ask!” she says, and her voice cracks. She covers her mouth with her hand for a moment, steadying. “Like–like did you ever ask Even, did you _ask_ him why he attempted suicide?”

Yousef ducks his head, doesn’t look up again.

“ _Hallo?_ ” she prompts, angrily. “No? Okay, so another: did you know that the boys aren’t homophobic, actually? Your best friends, did you ask them?”

He doesn’t look up. She drops her voice low, taking a steadying breath. 

“You think you’re right about things that you don’t know _anything_ about, and you’re too scared to ask in case you’re wrong,” she says, and it’s not meant to be mean, it’s just truth, laid between them.

He doesn’t look up. He has at least five inches of height on her, but it’s hard to tell now, with how much he has shrunken his presence, cut down. 

“When you stop asking people, and just assume everything,” she says. “ _That’s_ where ignorance comes from, where hate comes from. Not religion, or whatever else you want to blame it on.”

When he looks up, he has a stubborn set to his mouth, eyes closed off. There’s nothing soft or sensitive left.

“You’re right, obviously, you’re right,” Yousef says, looking a little sick about it. “But like – what’s left, Sana?”

“Like, once you’ve proven your point? Once people believe you and you’re right, and they’re fucked up, and things are fucked up…” he trails off, sighs. “I don't know what I’m trying to prove. I’m going to go now. That’s what’s left for me, I think.”

She stares at him, mirroring the stubborn set of his mouth. The corners of his mouth quirk up in a humorless smile. 

He goes, after that. 

* * *

_saturday june 3, 22:50_

* * *

_monday june 5, 11:45_

* * *

_monday june 5, 13:01_

_FEAR_

Sana checks her phone, for the fifth time in the last minute. She presses her back against the brick of the school building, around the corner from where she saw Sara, Ingrid, and some of the other girls perched on a bench from the library window. She hadn’t heard from any of the girls besides Noora since Friday, and their radio silence fed into an awful, consuming anxiety that whispered lies into her ears until they sounded true.

She takes a breath and walks out into the courtyard. 

**“** Can I talk to you?”

Sara looks up from her phone and regards Sana blankly. “Huh? Sure? What’s up?”

Sana catches sight of herself in the window behind the bench that Sara, Ingrid, and the other blondes are perched on, all black everything. Her face is all stark purple lipstick and black scarf in the distortion of the reflection. 

“Alone,” Sana amends, and steps a bit away from the girls on the bench. 

Sana faces off with Sara, arms loose at her sides. Sara crosses her arms, shifts her weight. 

“What's up?” Sara repeats. 

Sana feels the familiar growl of anger twist in her stomach, and she steadies herself. _Repel evil with that which is best._

She takes a breath. “I know you were trying to kick me off the bus behind my back.” 

Sara looks confused. “Huh? No? Where did you get that idea?” 

“Don't play dumb,” Sana says sharply. “I heard the girls talking about it at SYNG. You signed the papers with Mari without me, and you were going to kick me off the bus.” 

“What?” Sara says, her eyebrows furrowing. “We’re all sad that you left the bus, I told you in the email that I thought you were going to be a great bus boss.”

Sana stares at her. She looks around at the familiar courtyard, at the rest of the girls looking curiously in their direction, just to check that she was still in the same reality. “Why are you bothering lying right now?”

Sara shifts her bag on her shoulder, eyes scanning the faces behind Sana before looking back at her. She shifts tack. “It’s not how you're thinking it was,” she says, looking uncomfortable. “I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to have this conversation.”

“No shit,” Sana says plainly. “How was it, then?”

Sara crosses her arms tighter across herself, shifts her weight. 

“A bunch of the girls told me that they didn’t feel comfortable being on the bus with you there,” she says finally. 

When she continues, it’s gentle, tentative, like she’s laying it across Sana’s shoulders. 

“They said they didn’t feel safe.”

“What?” Sana asks. 

“They were scared of you,” Sara says, like she’s repeating something, though she’s not. There’s a difference between _not feeling safe_ , and scared of _you_.

She continues without waiting for Sana’s response, relentless, her eyes alight now that she’s talked herself into a truth that she can use, something that feels real enough to protect herself. “What else was I supposed to do? I didn’t want to hurt your feelings, but they were like, fearful for their _safety_. That’s a little more important, don’t you think?”

She lowers her voice. “I mean, we heard what happened at Urra. And honestly, with the way you were questioning me about everything, we all thought you were going to snap any moment.” _._

Sana blinks, once, twice. 

“No one ever said anything to me about this,” Sana says, and it sounds stupid, plain. 

“Well, it’s not something that anyone wants to say,” Sara says, like it’s obvious. 

Sana’s mouth falls open, and she makes a noise of disbelief. 

The list of things that Sana does not want to do, does not want to deal with, and has found herself doing anyway is practically endless. The long, miserable march towards healing that brought her to this point was something that she did not want to do, did not ask for, and she’s not even sure that she’ll ever be able to look back on and be thankful for it in the way you’re supposed to when you learn things, not when it was so unnecessarily violent and ugly and lonely. 

But it’s not sustainable to expect justice in this inherently unjust world, a world that she’s always known to be racist, a world that is actively often trying to kill her and her people. She and Sara have an inherently different tolerance for pain, for discomfort. 

“I didn’t have a choice, really. I’m sure you get where this is coming from, like, it’s understandable.” She pauses, eyeing Sana’s hijab, her dark lipstick. “I mean, isn’t scary kind of your vibe?”

It is astounding in its audacity. _I’m sure_ _you get where this is coming from, indict yourself, validate my fragility, agree with me so that this is less racist_

“Are you blaming me for this?” Sana asks, but it feels like it comes from somewhere else, outside of her. It must be loud, because Sara looks around again, leans back on her heels like she’s trying to escape. 

Sana feels full up of nothing. It’s the feeling of dismissal, of being marginalized into non-existence. What is her pain compared to theirs, really? Even if theirs was imagined, something dreamed up to excuse their racism, it was still held with more dignity. 

Sara looks confused. She’s confused a lot, Sana notes dizzily, for such a fucking gossip. “I mean-no, of course not,” she says, hurriedly. “But like, the girls can’t really help how they feel. Like, if they’re scared, they’re scared. You can’t just tell them not to be scared.”

It’s a ridiculous thing to say. To try to justify their actions by calling it fear is a complete comedy, but it’s one that she entertains without even realizing, because Sara is white, and Sana has _pandering to white women_ engraved in her muscle memory so deep that it’s written on her fucking bones. It’s something she learned when she decided she wanted to survive in this world.

But all at once, as she looks into the beige blur of Sara’s face, Sana finds a strange peace: not rooted in complacency, but instead in the undeniable, unstoppable truth that things _must change,_ things _will change_ , and she’s responsible for making it happen, today, every damn day of her life. 

_Do those who commit sins think that they can ever fool us? Wrong indeed is their judgment._

“They’re not fucking scared of _me_ ,” Sana spits. “They’re scared of my hijab, they’re scared of my god, they’re scared of my brown brother and his brown friends, they’re scared of anything that’s not _exactly like them_.”

“Are you calling us _racist?_ ” Sara says, taken aback. “How does this have anything to do with race, Sana?”

“What the–,” Sana starts, but Sara cuts her off. 

“And seriously, Sana, people have good reason to be scared of your brother and his friends! Who just goes and beats people up for being gay? If that’s what Islam teaches, then I’m not surprised at all of the vio –” 

Then, three things happen one after the other.

The first is that Sana feels a white-hot rage fill her entire body, consuming. It’s the kind of mad that pulls you out of yourself, blinds you with it. Her hands clench at her sides, and she opens her mouth to shout _something_ , anything to keep Sara from spewing more bullshit about her brother, about her god.

The second is that the adhan begins to ring out, loud and clear, calling her to prayer. 

The third is that Vilde marches up from somewhere behind Sana, and Sana barely catches a look at her mouth set in a stubborn line, eyes too-wide and furious, before she punches Sara, a full-on right hook to her cheek that lands with a nasty, satisfying crunch.

The world launches into motion, students from the courtyard running over to watch the fight, the Pepsi-Max girls leaping up and skirting the edges, nervously darting in to make feeble efforts to break them apart. Eva, Chris, and Noora all rush over and throw themselves bodily into the fray, and seeing them makes Sana snap out of her stunned reverie, back into her body. 

On the floor, braced over Sara, each with fistfuls of each others’ hair, Sana hears Vilde scream, breath coming in spurts between each word, “ _Don’t – talk – about – things – you – don’t – know – anything – about!_ ”

Sana’s eyes burn, the emotion coming so quick that it almost feels sharp, it’s so fucking _ridiculous_ , the whole thing, absurd and overwhelming, ludicrous and _real_ , that Sana laughs with disbelief, a bright, shocked thing, and it catches in her throat. 

“Sana!” Eva calls from where she’s trying to pry Vilde’s hand from the puffy lapel of Sara’s jacket. “ _Hallo!_ You’re the strongest, a little help here?”

She’s vaguely aware that she must look completely bizarre, too-bright smile, face wet from surprised, happy tears. Campus security is already running across the courtyard, but she takes a breath before throwing herself into the fight anyway, another wet, joyful laugh escaping as she does, shoulder to shoulder with Eva, Chris, Vilde, Noora. 

They get Vilde separated from Sara just before the authorities reach them, and Noora pushes Sana behind her as they approach, shielding her with their four bodies in a line.

“If you fuck with Sana, you fuck with us!” Vilde yells, squirming against Chris and Eva’s grip on her arms towards Sara, still on the ground, groaning. Eva holds strong but she nods, looking down at her and muttering, “ _Bitches,”_ under her breath. 

With the din of the fight settled, the sound of the adhan comes back to her consciousness, still calling out from the pocket of her blazer. She pulls it out, stares down at the screen, then up at the sky, clear and blue, then to the girls, the solid line of their backs between her and the rest of the world. 

Sana closes her eyes, listens to it ring out. She takes a deep breath in and it feels like waking up. 

* * *

**__** _tuesday june 6, 14:13_

* * *

_tuesday june 6, 14:44_

_BLOOD_

“You can say you told me so.”

The living room is quiet and the street outside the window is calm save one lone sedan. They’re sitting on the couch facing each other, one of Sana’s legs tucked up underneath her and her elbow braced against the back of the couch, fist supporting her head. 

“I wouldn't say that,” Fatiha says gently, placing her hand on Sana’s knee. 

Sana sighs. “Okay, well, say _something_ then.”

Fatiha looks out the window over Sana’s shoulder. She exhales, rubs at the lined skin over her eyebrow, where her worry has collected over the years and three children. “I wish that you still trusted me,” she says, at length. Guilt seizes Sana’s stomach, low and tight.

“I do trust you,” Sana insists, leaning closer. “It’s not that I don't trust you.”

Quiet sits between them, the weight of the emergent truth filling the space. Fatiha had never met the girls, any of them, until that afternoon. Sana ducks her head, looks where her mother’s soft, brown hand rests on her knee, thumb moving soothingly side to side. 

Sana takes a breath, then looks up at her mother from under her lashes. “Do you want to hear about them? My friends?”

Fatiha’s face softens, a smile curling at the corners of her mouth. Her eyes are warm with the love that Sana has seen there every day of her life, constant, endless. “I want to hear everything, my love.”

*

Sana lays with her head in Fatiha’s lap, their scarves long since abandoned, draped over the arm of the couch. Fatiha smooths the baby hairs at Sana’s temple with her thumb. 

“I wanted her to know that she couldn’t just get away with it,” Sana admits, her palm resting on her stomach. “Maybe I would have punched her, too, if Vilde hadn’t. I feel so angry all the time.”

Fatiha stills her thumb, presses her palm flat to Sana’s head. “Anger will eat away at your heart,” she says; not a warning, an acknowledgement. “I was very angry for a long time. It made me tired.”

Sana hums low in her throat, eyes trained on the ceiling where the fan is spinning lazily. “How did you stop?”

Quiet sits between them, two lifetimes of struggle in the weight of Sana’s head in her mother’s lap, brown girl to brown woman. 

Fatiha breathes out, all the way. She looks down at Sana, eyes soft. “You’re sweet to think that I ever stopped.”

She purses her lips, thinking. “Why do you think I was worried about you hanging out with only Norwegian girls?”

Sana furrows her eyebrows. “Um. Because they have different values than us?”

“Hm,” Fatiha tilts her head in reluctant agreement. “In a way, that’s true. But I think I’m viewing values differently.”

Sana nods to prompt her to continue, shifting to sit up and look at her properly.

“It’s not about right and wrong, or drinking or not, religious or not,” Fatiha says, slowly, still ordering the thoughts in her mind. “But more, _who_ is valued above others, outside of this house, our community.”

“When we first got here, your father and I were so young,” she says, propping her elbow up on the back of the couch and supporting her face with her palm. Sana can almost see this younger Fatiha in the gesture, brave and silly, whip smart, ambitious, and beautiful. “And we both jumped right into school, me into nursing and him to his residency. But it was a different time—it’s not like now, where people will just stare and pretend they don't see us as different. People told were mean, especially the women in my program. Nursing is a competitive field, and things get ugly.”

“They used to say things behind my back,” she says, her eyes finding Sana’s. “Saying I should go home, that I didn't deserve to be there, whatever. Ugly, ugly things. And so I worked hard, harder than them, harder than anyone, to prove myself, that I belonged.”

“I scored in the 98th percentile on my nursing exams. I was so proud. And I was so excited to get away from these girls, and get to work,” she sighs. “But I started applying to hospital jobs—I must have applied to every hospital and clinic within 50 miles in every direction—and I got interviews everywhere, and then I would get rejected. Over and over again. I tried everything, I tried to change the way I talked, I bought new clothes...”

“I called your grandmother crying one day. I was very upset,” she says, her voice very soft and her eyes far away. “I told her, I have to take off the hijab. I can't succeed in this country.”

“I didn't know you thought about uncovering,” Sana says. It's barely over a breath. The world had become very small around them without her noticing.

Fatiha nods. “Of course. Who wouldn't?” she asks. “But your _jadda_ said to me, in her way, you know— _Fatiha, that hijab is in your blood. You take it off, and they'll cut you open to prove it’s still there.”_

“Ouch,” Sana says.

“She didn't mean it like _ouch_ , I don't think,” Fatiha reassures her, reaching out to tuck a lock of Sana’s hair behind her ear. “A little, maybe. But I understood after that. I thought a lot about all of the things in my blood, habibti.”

“I thought I was not enough–I let them teach me that I wasn’t enough,” she says, softly, gently. “But they didn’t know anything about who I was. I kept wishing to be white, but would they ever wish to be brown like me?”

Sana snorts at the thought.

“You’re laughing now. This is what I mean, Sana, this is why I didn’t want you to spend too much time with Norwegians,” Fatiha says, insistent. “Why shouldn’t they wish to be brown? Do you know what runs in this blood?”

“Bravery. Resilience. Grace, and patience, and revolution, and love,” Fatiha nods. “This hijab runs in my blood, and the strength of all the women who fought to wear it before me. The joy of the women who come after me.”

She bops Sana’s nose with her index finger, smiling. “I decided after that that anyone who didn’t value all of that wasn’t worth my time, or anger. They must be stupid not to see the glory in me. I don’t need them to change. We’re powerful enough without them.”

Sana nods, slowly, staring at her mother so hard that her eyes burn. Her heart feels too full, like it’s stretching out and bumping against her lungs. It’s an anxious feeling, standing on the edge of a radical new truth.

“Baba started his own practice and we worked together,” she finishes. “Making your own path is sometimes easier than repaving the road to suit you.”

“But anyway,” Fatiha says, wrapping her arm around Sana’s shoulders and tilting their heads together. “I think I was wrong. It sounds like your friends may see the glory in you, after all, my love. Hold them close, if they do.”

Sana hums in acknowledgement, turning her face into the warm, fragrant line of Fatiha’s neck. “I love you, mama.”

“Of all of the things in my blood,” Fatiha murmurs, lips against her temple. “My love, my light – it’s _you_ that I’m most proud to carry.”

* * *

_tuesday june 6, 22:05_

* * *

**__** _wednesday june 7, 14:30_

_the truth_

_OK Sana, are you in front of the school now?_

_I’m here, where are you all_

_Pepsimax are all hanging out right next to me,[hurry up](https://vimeo.com/225771564) _

*

The ceiling of the van is dotted with glow in the dark stars. It must be late by now, but the dark tint of the windows and the surreal, effervescent happiness of the day has taken them out of time, bundled tight in their own world. The girls have gone quiet, all of them lying at various angles on their backs on the floor of the van, their heads clustered in the center. A soft ballad is playing, tinny and faint, from Noora’s phone resting on one of the seats.

Sana thinks it feels like magic. The van, these girls, this night – it feels like _hers_ , something that needs her, that she needs back. It’s a heady feeling. She closes her eyes, reaching for her phone to check the time, but hits a hand instead. When Sana opens her eyes to look, Chris’ lovely, round face is tilted toward her with a smile and she threads their fingers together fondly. 

Noora breaks the silence. 

“Can we play a game?” she asks, but her voice is very serious and very soft. Sana strains her neck to look at her expression, but Noora’s face is still tilted firmly towards the ceiling, mouth soft. “A truth game.”

Eva yawns, stretching as much as she can without hitting anyone else. “What are the rules?”

Noora’s head falls towards Eva, and her eyes are impossibly fond. Sana understands that look. It is a rarity to have a friend that you can always count on as readily as one can count on Eva. She begins, in her meandering way, “The rules are, if you want, you have to say something that is true.” She pauses to think for a moment. “And… if you don’t want to… there’s no consequences.”

Chris snorts. “If there’s no consequences, that’s not a game,” she insists. “If you don’t want to… we’ll come up with a cool new nickname to call you until the next turn.”

“That’s not even a bad consequence,” Sana says. 

“Yeah, but I like that,” Eva pipes up. “No bad vibes in the loser van. We’ve had enough bad vibes.”

“I agree, no bad vibes! We’re going to be nice to each other from now on!” Vilde says, turning over onto her side to face Sana and smiling sweetly.

“Nice,” Sana agrees, feeling generous. 

“I’ll start,” Eva says abruptly. “I’ve been texting with Jonas.”

Vilde hums in acknowledgement. “Do you… want to get back together with him?”

“No,” Eva says, confident. Then doubles back, “I mean–no, seriously, no.”

“Truth game is for truth,” Chris says sagely.

“Okay, then, I don’t know,” Eva says with a huff, letting her head roll to one side. “Someone else go now.”

“I’ll go next,” Chris volunteers, turning her face towards Sana. Sana turns towards her. “The truth is… I’m sorry for not believing you straight away, Sana. I think we all are.”

Chris’ face is not built to hold seriousness for so long, made to twist into bright, life-giving belly laughs and open-mouthed smiles. Her eyebrows are drawn tight together, and her expressive mouth is in a firm line. “It’s part of why we got the van, but the van is just… a fun, silly thing, you know? Like we all wanted the van but it’s not an apology, so you should know that it was wrong, too.”

All around her, the girls are nodding. Sana looks at Chris’ serious face, serious about making sure that Sana receives her apology. Sana smiles, soft. She loves her so much in that moment that it feels like it’s going to start bubbling out of her and filling the van. She squeezes Chris’ hand in her own. 

“Thanks, Chris,” she says, voice barely above a whisper. She tilts their heads together.

Vilde clears her throat quietly. “I have something to say,” she says. “It’s about my mom.”

Sana reaches out to hold Vilde’s hand, and Vilde looks at her and smiles as they lace their fingers together. She turns her head back up to the stars, but Sana keeps her eyes trained on her face. 

“My mom is… sick,” she says, voice steady and matter-of-fact. “She’s sick, and so she can’t take care of me. So I take care of her a lot, instead. But I get tired, sometimes. It’s hard, sometimes.”

Her voice cracks at the end, but her eyes are dry. She squeezes Sana’s hand, and Sana grips hard back. Vilde nods, tightly.

“I think that I like girls.”

The voice comes so suddenly, and so quietly, that it takes Sana a moment to place that it came from Noora.

“Seriously?!” Eva bursts out. 

They all sit up, almost as one to turn to face her. Eva recovers, “I mean, I’m fucking happy for you, of course! Honestly, that came out wrong, seriously.”

A lot of things play through Sana’s head at once. It’s hard to tell which is which, but there are threads of Yousef, William, Eva, and Noora twisted and tangled together in flashes of memory. She thinks of the impossibly fond look on Noora’s face less than ten minutes ago. 

Noora looks very much unlike herself, small, fragile, pale-lipped. Sana thinks of the way that Isak looks alive now, vibrant with the force of his truth, and tries to think of what to say to help Noora light up in the same way.

“How do you feel about that?” Sana asks. The girls all lean closer. 

Noora twists a lock of her fine, white hair between her fingers. “It makes me feel happy, I think. But I feel bad. In general,” she says in that same quiet, quiet voice, eyes trained on her boots where her legs are crossed under her. “So many people are hurting because it took me so long to figure things out.”

Vilde grabs Noora’s hand, and Noora looks up at her. Vilde’s eyes are wide, wider than usual with something that Sana can’t quite place. “Don’t feel bad. You shouldn’t feel bad. It’s hard–it must be so hard.”

“Okay so, truth game, who is your new girlfriend, then?” Chris interrupts, just as Vilde and Noora’s eyes are beginning to go all shiny around the edges. Noora rubs at her eyes with her free hand, lets out a watery laugh. 

“Aw, Chris,” Noora says, leaning forward to throw her arms around Chris’ shoulders. It’s an awkward hug, with two pairs of crossed legs between them, but looking at them makes Sana want to cry, too. “People who like girls never get girlfriends.”

“We’ll get you a girlfriend,” Eva insists, tipping over to join in their hug. The look that Noora gives Eva is sad, so sad. Sana is glad that Eva can’t see it from where she’s positioned. 

“I love you girls,” Noora says, after a while. “Thank you for being patient with me.”

“We have to go at our own pace with these things,” Vilde reassures her. “I read that when I thought you were a lesbian before.”

Noora laughs again, leaning back to rest against the seat. “You read things?”

Vilde looks confused. “I always go and read things if one of you says I’m wrong about something,” she says. “So that I can learn? Doesn’t everyone?”

Sana feels a rush of fondness for Vilde, for her bumbling sweetness, for her commitment to her growth. “That’s why you’re the first I’m taking to war,” Sana says, smiling. “And for your sick right hook.”

“How sweet!” Vilde says, beaming.

Noora rubs under her eye to fix where her mascara has smudged. “Okay, Sana, it’s just you left,” she says.

“How am I supposed to follow that?” Sana asks.

Chris pats her on the shoulder. “All truths matter in the truth game.”

“Sana, I bet you have something good,” Eva says, from where she’s tucked herself into Vilde’s side. “You have loads of secrets.”

Guilt twists in Sana’s stomach, recalls the way her mother said, _I wish you trusted me_. Eva is right, she had loads of secrets. And the reasons to keep quiet about them floated further from her by the day, and inverse relationship to the way her heart has bloomed open, awake. 

Sana takes a breath.

“I like Yousef,” she admits. It comes out in the present tense even though she meant for it to be in the past. 

Noora lights up. “I knew it!” she exclaims, pointing at Sana and rising up to stand on her knees. “I knew it–I knew it, seriously.”

Sana stares at her blankly. “Huh?”

“What? Didn’t Elias say Noora was dating Yousef?” Eva asks, confused. “But then now Noora likes girls. Well, Noora liked girls then, too. Just also now. I’m so lost.”

“No no no no no,” Noora babbles, waving a hand. “We kissed, or actually, I kissed him, because–– because everything is stupid, but okay, seriously, you have to read this–”

She cuts herself off, and reaches for her phone, scrolling through rapidly. 

“Some highlights,” she preludes, dramatically. “Well first, he messaged me after I kissed him, and said that he didn’t want Sana to know about it, because he liked her. And I said I wouldn’t, since I was the one who kissed him, and it was a mistake, because I was just using him to–– to– whatever. Anyway, the highlights.”

She lowers her voice to something that must be an approximation of Yousef’s voice. “ _What are you doing? I seriously need advice. I just talked to Sana, and I think she hates me. I don’t want her to hate me. I swear, we’re soulmates._ ” 

Vilde squeals and claps her hands. “ _Soulmates_ , seriously! So he likes you too, Sana!”

Sana rolls her eyes. “I know he likes me already,” she says. “He told me on Saturday. But he’s still a coward. Before he talked to me, he hadn’t had a proper conversation with me for like a month, even though he obviously knew I was upset. He even said in the text that he knew.”

Chris jumps in, raising her eyebrows. “But you said you _like_ him, like now!”

Sana opens her mouth to explain, but Eva cuts her off.

“I’m with Sana. He sounds like a wimp. He was chatting you this whole time and never said anything to Sana? And if he actually cared, he should have told Sana that he kissed you in the first place instead of trying to hide it,” Eva says. “Sounds like a fuckboy to me.”

Noora looks distressed, eyes darting from Eva to Sana. “No, it’s not like that at all. He cares about her so much.”

“It’s not just that. He said some stuff about Elias, and the rest of the boys, and Even –– and it just wasn’t true. He didn’t even ask them, he just thought of his own reasons for why things happened. I can’t be with someone like that,” Sana says, folding her arms across her chest and leaning back against the van seats. 

Vilde bites her lip, clearly torn. She looks between Sana and Noora. “You told him this, right?” she asks, and Sana nods. “Don’t you think that people can grow?”

Sana looks at her, a retort on her lips. But then she thinks about Vilde. She really, really thinks about Vilde. And she nods. “People can grow,” she admits.

The van goes quiet again, each of the girls thinking about the situation, the music coming into focus again now that their chatter isn’t obstructing it. Sana thinks too. She thinks about the Yousef that she thought she knew, her whole life. Sweet, shy Yousef, genuine, honest, intent. She couldn’t remember when he started looking at her like she strung the stars across the sky, but she could remember when he stopped. _I think what’s left for me is to go._

She loves him, she has loved him, in so many ways, for so many reasons, ways that she can’t take back, reasons that don’t go away even though he’s hurt her, even though he might not be who she always knew. But she wants to be strong. She wants to love herself at least as much as her heart wants to love him. She deserves that.

Noora’s voice comes, very slow, very quiet through the dark. “It’s like… hasn’t something ever meant _so much_ to you that you almost can’t show it to the world? You want to protect it, whatever it is, because it’s something that’s really true, the kind of thing that like, sits in your soul and builds the rest of you around itself.”

Sana thinks about her faith. She thinks about how she showed it to Yousef, how she cracked open her chest, and how hard it’s been to put herself back together. 

“Sana, I seriously think that’s how he feels about you,” Noora whispers, grabbing for her hand. “And I’m going to be just… completely wrecked if I messed it up for you both. It’s not about me, I know that, but I’m going to feel awful about it forever.”

“He might be a coward. I mean, he is one,” she says, looking imploringly at Sana. “And I’m a coward too, don’t you think? But I feel pretty brave, today.”

Noora pauses, presses her lips together. “So maybe instead of being cowardly, it just means that we take a little extra time to gather our courage. But we get there. I got there.”

She looks at the girls, at this weird, little world that they’ve created, where truths are poured across the floor, and hearts are opened up and held with care, and she knows that it isn’t real, that it can’t last. But it feels real, it really does. And she wants, more than anything, to believe in this world. 

“What are you thinking, Sana?” Chris asks, leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees. 

“I’m thinking that I love you all,” Sana says, because it’s the truth game. “And I’m thinking that I’m going to keep thinking.”

Eva sighs. “Ugh. Being mature is so anticlimactic, don’t you think?”

Sana stares at Eva for a moment, before they both break out into laughter, senseless, bright, joyful. The other girls join in, one by one, until they’re piled on top of one another, giggling. It’s a simple kind of love, spread thin over them like an emergency blanket, warm, life-saving. 

When they quiet, Vilde speaks up, the last of their laughter still in her voice. “Okay, but how about you invite Yousef and the boys to Eva’s party, at least? Then we can all see how he acts, and have a better sense of the situation. And also, I think the other boys want to clear the air with them, too? Magnus keeps talking about it.”

Eva claps delightedly. “Yeah, invite them! And how about the hijab squad, too? You’ve been hanging out with them, again, right? Do you think any of them would be girlfriend material for Noora?”

Noora laughs, and tilts her head against Eva’s shoulder fondly. 

Sana purses her lips and looks from Eva to Vilde. “Okay, okay, one thing at a time,” Sana says. “ _Maybe_ I’ll invite them.”

“Maybe _I’ll_ invite them,” Eva retorts, waving her phone at Sana. 

Sana rolls her eyes, lolls her head against the seats behind her. “I said I’m _thinking_ about it,” she sighs. 

Noora grabs her hand again, without picking up her head from Eva’s shoulder. “ _Sana, Sana, Sana_ ,” she sing-songs softly. “Too much thinking can kill you. What does your heart say?”

* * *

_thursday june 8, 11:21_

* * *

_thursday june 8, 22:35_

_alhamdulillah_

There’s a knock at her door, and she uses it as an excuse to flop back on her bed, letting her books and papers fall off of her lap. “Yeah?”

Elias opens the door, holding a box of pizza and grinning. “Hungry?”

He comes into the room and sets the pizza down on her bed, crinkling the papers.

“Yo, be careful,” she warns, pushing the papers to the side. “I’m not going to win a Nobel prize by the time I’m 45 if you crush my notes.”

“I’m going to change your rapper name to Lil Einstein,” he retorts, but adjusts the box to a less destructive position. He leans over to grab a stray piece of paper from the ground, folded in half. “Is this part of them?”

He hands it to her, and she unfolds it.

_Is your favorite color really black?_

The handwriting is unfamiliar, but she colors immediately, shuffling it into her notes as subtly as she can manage. “Yeah, thanks.”

“Why are you being weird?” Elias, as a middle child, can sniff out vulnerabilities like a police dog. He makes a grab for the stack of papers, and Sana shoves them behind her back, laying down flat on top to keep him from getting at them. 

“Mind your own business!” Sana yells as he shoves her and wriggles his hand under her back. 

He grunts as she lands an elbow to a soft part of his stomach and bites back, “ _You are my business!_ ” as he pulls the paper free. 

“Got’em,” he hoots triumphantly, flopping back against the bed. He only manages to hold it in front of his face for a second before Sana snatches it away again, but it’s long enough. “That’s from Yousef!”

Sana rolls her eyes and shoots him an offended look as she orders her notes and shoves them into her biology book before any more damage can come to them. She throws open the lid of the pizza box and he raises his eyebrows at her. 

She shuts her eyes forcefully, and murmurs her du’a to break the fast, _Allahumma inni laka sumtu wa bika aamantu wa alayka tawakkaltu wa ala rizq-ika-aftartu_ , taking a moment of peace and gratitude before she opens her eyes to glare at her brother again.

“ _O-_ kay, Sana,” Elias says emphatically before closing his eyes and following suit. When he opens his eyes again, Sana is still glaring. It’s rude, she knows, but she’s annoyed that she can’t just get rid of these stupid feelings, hates that Yousef managed to ambush her without even being present. She doesn’t even understand what he’s playing at. 

She reaches in to grab a slice of pizza and bites into it savagely. She leans back and chews, trying hard not to be moody about it. She hadn’t even realized how hungry she was until she swallows the first bite, greasy cheese and the sharp bite of the olives coating her mouth. She sighs, allowing her gratitude to carry away some of her irritation, and finds some grace.

“Sorry,” Sana says begrudgingly. She slides further down the headboard and further into her hijab. “I don’t even know what that’s all about.”

He shrugs. “It’s okay. I don’t really want to know.”

She sighs, and chews thoughtfully. “I mean,” she starts, and then falls quiet again. “Nevermind.”

Elias grabs his own slice of pizza, and swings her desk chair around so he can sit on it backwards next to the bed, but says nothing.

Then, like she can’t stand it any longer, Sana bursts out, “Like, has he always been like this? I swear he used to be smarter than this.”

Elias drapes his body over the back of the chair, and goes limp, groaning.

“Did he tell you about what happened with Noora? And what, he just let both of us be mad at him for weeks because he was scared? It’s completely idiotic.”

“I said–,” Elias interjects, but Sana cuts him off, slouching back against the headboard and taking another moody bite.

“Okay yeah, I know, sorry, just forget about it.”

Elias sits back up and tucks into his slice of pizza happily.

“Did you even fast today?” Sana asks, raising her eyebrows at him. 

“Jeeze, Sana,” Elias says, pushing with his feet to roll away from her a bit. “I told you I’m a good Muslim!”

“I never said you weren’t,” Sana says, smirking. “Don’t be sensitive.”

“Oh, wow,” Elias says, sarcastically. The vowels are extra round in his mouth, drawing out his disdain. “Can you be peaceful, please? It’s Ramadan.”

“You can’t just use the parts that you like and throw away the rest,” Sana says, suddenly fierce. 

“Yo,” Elias says, warningly, gesturing at her with his slice of pizza. “If you have something to say, just say it. I’ve spent long enough in Sana-purgatory. We’re done with that shit.”

Sana doesn't say anything, just reaches for the lukewarm water by her bed from the day before and tosses it back. She knows that it’s not really Elias that she’s annoyed with, but she picks at the scab anyway, prodding him because she knows he has to love her even when she's unfair. 

She peers at him, glass still raised to her mouth as he scrolls through facebook on his phone with his free hand. 

“Are you okay, Elias?” she asks, tentatively. Once she says it, she realizes she's been meaning to ask for a long time. She's just been caught up in herself, in all these things that seem so stupid now that they're settled. 

His head jerks up, startled. “Huh?”

Sana pauses, considering. “I’m just wondering about you?”

“Is this about before, at Noora’s?” he asks. He takes another bite, and doesn't offer anything else. 

“Um,” Sana says. “No. I mean. I know you drink. I’m not judging you.”

He sighs. “Everyone judges, Sana. I don't care.”

She bristles. “I’m _not_ judging! I’m trying to be supportive!” 

“ _I’m_ supposed to support _you_ ,” Elias says tightly. She recognizes the hard look in his eyes from her own face. He swallows, and then looks at his trainers, balanced on top of the wheels of her chair. 

“Sana, about Yousef—”

“I don't want to talk about it,” she snaps. They stare at each other hard, at an impasse.

He sighs again, lifts his hat to run a hand over his head. “You know I’m on _your_ team, right, Sana?” he asks, eyes searching. “You’re my number one, all I care about is that you’re happy.”

She loves him, of course, _obviously_. With a jolt, she recalls their last real conversation, on the swings, before all the bullshit happened. “We’re on each others’ team,” she corrects him, softening. 

Feeling sick, she says, “Elias…,” she trails off, trying to find the right words for _I’m fucking sorry I thought you were a homophobe, I’m sorry I took out all my anger on you when it was other people who deserved it, I’m sorry that you’ve been stuck loving me when I’ve been such complete shit to you._ It’s not the kind of thing they say to each other.

“Thank you,” she says, finally. It’s not enough, but she hopes that he understands her. “I love you, you know?”

“Now that you’ve eaten you say that,” he says, relaxing. Forgiveness wears so easily on him. He’s unbelievable, sometimes. She wishes she could be more like Elias, wishes she could have less anger so close to the surface of her heart. 

She sticks her tongue out at him, and takes another bite of her pizza. She chews, deliberating. 

Elias barks out a laugh, drawing her attention back to him, and turns his phone screen to show her a meme. “This is you.”

_When you catch your sibling walking around the fridge while fasting…_

She laughs, smacks his hand away. “Allah _is_ watching,” she says, going for ominous. “Did you see the one about the stolen J’s?”

“Who do you think I am?” he says, offended. But then he grins. “Honestly though, that was hilarious. I’d be pissed.”

They go quiet again. “We’re having a birthday party for Eva tomorrow,” Sana says, slowly. She nibbles idly on what’s left of her pizza crust. “She wanted me to invite you guys.”

He looks up at her, surprised. “All of us?”

Sana rolls her eyes to the ceiling, lets out a long-suffering sigh. “Yes.”

Elias grins. “I see you,” he says, but leaves it at that. “For sure. Your friends are chill.”

She chews on her bottom lip for a moment before continuing.

“But also, um,” she starts. “Even is coming too. With Isak?”

Elias can’t control his face to save his life, and she sees the nervous worry before he can school his features. 

“Is that okay?” she asks.

He rubs at his neck. “I mean, you’d have to ask the guy, not me,” he says. “He’s the one who stopped being friends with us, not the other way around.”

Sana gives him a small, reassuring smile. “I think you’d be surprised,” she says. “He asks after you, sometimes. I think he misses you.”

“Yeah?” Elias says, lifting his brows. “Tell him I say hi, then.”

“You can tell him yourself,” Sana says, pointing at his phone. “And you’ll see him on Friday, anyway. You know he’s dating my friend Isak?”

“Yeah,” Elias says, jumping into the bed next to her. “Shit, I’ll have to say sorry for beating up his boo then, too.”

Sana pats him on the shoulder. “Never apologize for punching Isak for being an idiot,” she says, fondly. “It’ll be a long time before he stops deserving it.”

“What a good friend,” he says sarcastically, flopping back against her pillows.

She shrugs. “I believe in justice,” she says, flippantly. She unlocks her phone and scoots closer to him. 

“Let’s take a selfie. _Hashtag iftar, hashtag alhamdulillah_ ,” she says, mocking. “Who knows when the next time you’ll break fast with me will be.”

“Fucking _drama_ ,” he says, rolling his eyes, but managing a wide, cheesy smile just as she snaps the picture.

“You’re my number one, too, you know” she says, glancing at him from the corner of her eye as she starts to upload the picture to her instagram.

He grins at her. “Send that to me, yeah?”

* * *

**__** _thursday june 8, 23:00_

* * *

**__** _friday june 9, 19:46_

_a thousand questions_

“Are you partied out already?”

Sana startles, and her head whips around to see Yousef drop down onto the bench next to her.

“Is it okay if I sit?” he asks. 

She narrows her eyes. “You're already sitting.”

“I can always get up. Don’t you think it's important to ask?” he says, voice wry. He gives her a self-deprecating smile, all downturned eyebrows and straight lines through the mouth for just a moment before looking down at his lap, then out at the party. 

She keeps her eyes on him. “Is that what you were doing with the note?”

He hums in acknowledgement, peering at her from the corner of his eye to gauge her reaction. 

She doesn't give. Her mouth tightens, lips pursing slightly. 

“Aren't you going to answer?” He nudges her gently, shoulder to shoulder. 

“Why do you want to know?”

His eyebrows draw together. “Why wouldn't I want to know?” he says, teasing. 

Sana looks out at the party in lieu of an answer, Elias and Mahdi dancing together as everyone shouts around them.

“Even and I had dinner together on Tuesday,” Yousef says, slow and intent. She turns her head to look at him sharply. His voice is casual, but his body is held with tension, too still, just a mimicry of ease. 

She sits up straighter, her body turning towards his. “Yeah?”

He continues, eyes sliding out to where Even is dancing on the outskirts of the circle, gangly, gentle, joyous. A sly smile crops up on his face, his chin turning incrementally towards her. “I asked him his favorite color.”

Sana breathes out a laugh, ducking her head. There's a reluctant smile on her face when she turns it back towards him and says, _oh okay_ , the laugh still carrying in her voice.

At her laugh, he slouches forward to brace his elbows on his knees and smiles wide at her from under his hair, all teeth and squinting eyes. The last of the sun lights him up. 

“Sana! Where’s Sana?” Eva calls out, drunk and affectionate, looking over both shoulders.

Yousef stands immediately and offers a hand to help her up. She stares at it. _Too much thinking will kill you. What does your heart say?_

Sana’s hand slides into his and his fingers curl along the edge of her palm, pulling forward and up. For a moment, they stand close, her hand tucked to his chest. She doesn’t look at his face. He releases her hand, takes a step back.

“It’s not black,” she says, quickly, intimately. 

When she looks up, he’s grinning, lit up golden and beaming. Looking at him makes her heart hurt. It’s overwhelming, terrifying in it’s loveliness. She wonders if he feels the same way when he looks at her, doesn’t understand how he can look so happy about it if he does.

He glances at the crowd of their friends, and then back to her. “Eva’s calling,” he says, gesturing towards her. 

Sana nods, and tears her eyes away from him to Eva, who has spotted her and is now gesturing incomprehensibly towards Yousef. She widens her eyes warningly to try and get her to stop, looking back quickly at Yousef to make sure he hadn’t seen. 

She needn’t have worried. His eyes are trained on her, impossibly warm, impossibly fond. 

Her mouth goes soft. She is very, very nervous, everything sweating, her skin prickling incessantly under layers of velvet in the summer. She wants a thousand things at the same time, she wants things to be simple, she wants to be the girl who can let things go, she wants everyone to go away. It’s so easy to forget all of the hurt, the doubt, when he’s in front of her, looking at her how he is. It’s so easy to forget.

She wants, desperately, to believe that this Yousef is the true one, and the one that kissed Noora was some stranger, a temporary alien. But he is both. He is painful, and joyful. He is cowardly, and brave. He’s learning. 

“I have more questions,” he says, low and serious. He tucks his hands into his pockets. “If you ever feel like answering, I’ll be waiting. As long as you need.”

He’s offering a brand of forgiveness that is woven through with work, with change. She’s learning, too.

Sana nods, staring into his face, sincere and true, it must be, the kind of true that you can lay foundations on, build a life around. She forces herself to turn away, eyes coming away last, long after the rest of her body has turned. 

When Sana reaches her, Eva screams delightedly, grabbing her arm and shaking it. “ _Oh my god_ , quit,” Sana pleads, covering Eva’s hand with her own in an attempt to soothe her. She looks back over her shoulder, unable to stop herself. 

Yousef is still looking after her. 

He looks at her, and looks at her, and looks at her, smiling, like he’d do it forever if she let him. 

*

Night falls around all of them. Chris produces a container of dates from inside when maghrib time comes, and the boys go wild, cheering as they all come together to open the fast. Elias slings an arm around her after they've both offered their dua’a. They all grab a date and Elias looks over his shoulder, eyes scanning the rest of the crowd. 

“Wait, Even’s here! Where’s Even? Come here, bro,” he demands, grabbing Even’s forearm and manhandling him against his other side once he gets close enough. “You can still open the fast with us, right? Like old times.” 

Even’s face is painted with surprise, eyes wide and happy, mouth pinched to try and control his smile. Sana peers at him around Elias’s chest, and he lets his smile bloom across his face fully as she catches his eye, taking a date from the container. “Like old times,” he repeats. 

Elias releases her to grab his own, and then says, “Okay, ready?” 

He grins, holds his date pinched between two fingers out towards her and she bumps her own date against it, rolling her eyes. 

“Cheers, habibti!” He pops it into his mouth, and she follows suit. 

“Cheers,” she echoes, chewing slowly, finally allowing her gaze to rest on Yousef mirroring the ritual with Mikael across the circle. The sweetness coats her mouth. 

“So it’s finally happening, then?” Even says from over her shoulder, and she startles, averting her gaze just as Yousef looks up at her. 

“Huh?” Sana asks, looking up at him. “No.”

“Elias isn’t listening, you don’t have to pretend,” he teases. Elias has indeed been swept off, pulled away by Eskild who has two dates held aloft, waving them close to Elias’ face. 

“He knows, anyway,” Sana says. She adds, “Not that there’s anything to know.”

“Mmhm,” Even says, just a low rumble. “Okay. You don’t like him, then?”

She pointedly doesn’t respond, busies herself with grabbing a bottle of water from the table to her left, cracking it open and drinking deeply. 

Even looks at Yousef, who has moved on to attempting to teach Jonas to body roll. “He’s sweet,” Even says, finally. “You have the same heart.”

She swallows one last gulp of water, gasping an inhale after. “The same heart, really?” Sana says, raising her eyebrows. “You’ve gone completely soft.”

He shrugs. “Being hard and closed up hasn’t done anything good for me lately,” he says, eyes flickering to hers. “But I’m serious.”

She is serious, too. “He’s not a Muslim,” she says, quietly.

Even sighs, pushes a hand through his hair. “Yeah, he told me that,” he says. “It made me feel like shit.”

Sana grimaces, looks down at her shoes, nestled into the grass. “It’s just an excuse,” she says, the truth coming to her as she says it. “I mean–like, obviously, it was part of it. But it can’t be the only reason.”

Even shrugs. “You’re probably right. Either way, he’s not a Muslim,” he says. “I take it that’s an issue for you.”

“For Islam,” she corrects.

He raises his eyebrows. “Are the issues of Islam different than yours?”

“Huh?” she says, looking at him sharply. 

“It’s just a question, Sana,” Even says, softening through his brow. “It’s okay, whatever your answer is.”

Sana forces herself to relax, but she holds the tension in her chest. Her mind rolls over it again and again. She smooths the fabric of her hijab against the velvet of her top for something to do with her hands.

“Ah–I’m sorry,” he says, face scrunching, shifting his weight from his toes to heels. “I’m really not the person who should be talking to you about this. All I wanted to say is that, he’s sweet. I think his heart is good, the same way yours is. That’s all.”

She nods, giving him a tight-lipped smile. “Thanks.”

Elias bounds over, clapping Even on the shoulder. “I think we’re gonna go get food, for real. The hot dogs aren’t halal. You two coming?”

Sana takes stock of the girls. Chris and Eskild are the only ones still on the dancefloor, Eskild leading Chris in a complicated twist, both of their heads thrown back with laughter. Vilde tangled up with Magnus on one of the lawn chairs, Eva making out with Penetrator Chris, Sana notes with surprise, considering she hadn’t noticed him arrive. Sana glances over to where Jonas and Yousef are standing, and finds his gaze on Eva and his body roll somehow even more pathetic than before. Noora is deep in conversation with Linn, but she’s watching Eva too, Sana can tell. 

Sana feels exhaustion collapse onto her all at once, heart aching from holding space for everyone, from her own complicated feelings, made more complicated as fondness seeps unbidden into her heart the longer she watches Yousef twist his body into sillier and sillier shapes to try and draw Jonas’ attention back. 

“I think I’m going to go home, actually. I’m really tired,” she says, turning back to face Elias. “Even, you should go, though.”

“Is that okay?” Even asks, tentative. Elias looks back at him, confused.

“Duh, bro. Let’s roll. Sana, how are you getting home?”

She chews her bottom lip considering, looking up to check the cloud cover. “It’s nice out. I can walk from here.”

“By yourself at night? Yeah right,” Elias scoffs. 

“Are you going to stop me?” Sana says, raising her eyebrows. 

Even backs away. “I’m gonna go get Isak,” he says warily, calling on years of practice avoiding getting pulled into Sana and Elias’ arguments.

Elias faces off. “No, you’re free to do whatever you want,” he says, but it’s mocking, because he knows that she knows that he’s right.

Sana bristles, feeling very young and very trapped. Her eyes land on Yousef across the yard, shrugging his jacket back on. “Yousef will walk me,” she says impulsively.

“Huh?” Elias splutters. “He’s coming with us!”

“Ask him then,” she says, crossing her arms and projecting arrogance. But once Elias turns and stalks off towards Yousef with a glare, nerves seize her chest like a vice, a litany of self-flagellation immediately starting up in her head, _why the hell what the fuck were you thinking_ _literally you just blew him off stupid stupid stupid_. 

She stares at them intently, trying to distinguish what’s happening from the back of Elias’ head. Yousef shrugs, rolling his shoulders back and pushing a hand through his hair. It could be casual, maybe, but when he sees her watching them, a grin breaks out across his face, wide and goofy. 

He raises a hand in greeting, tilting his head towards the driveway. Elias looks over his shoulder and sees her, then turns back and shoves Yousef. 

Sana’s nerves take on a new character, low and warm in the base of her stomach, burning. She’s smiling, she realizes, she couldn’t have helped it even if she tried. 

*

“I’ve prepared a little,” Yousef admits, wiping his hands on his pants and digging his phone out from his pocket. “Is that lame to say?”

Their walk to her home began awkwardly, Elias threatening Yousef bodily until Mutta put him in a chokehold and waved them off with his other hand. They walked quietly, side by side, until Sana’s stomach broke the silence, growling so oddly that Yousef had stopped and stared at her before they both broke out into laughter. 

_19 hours without food!_

_I’m not judging, Sana._

They had stopped at McDonald’s along the way at her insistence and his reluctance.

_You need real food!_

_I don’t know why you’re being disrespectful to french fries._

They’re perched at the lip of a dry fountain in the park near her flat, facing in towards the odd, green statue of a little boy riding a carp in the center of the basin. Sana raises her eyebrows at him, biting into a fry. 

“Did you know this was going to happen?”

His face is lit up blue from the phone screen. “Of course not,” he says, side-eyeing her from his bent position. “Have you met you? I never know what you’re going to do next.”

She laughs, leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees. 

“But it’s always better to be prepared,” he says, grinning at her. “Okay, here we go.”

“What, do you have a list?” she says, peering over at the screen. 

He snatches it away, shielding it from her view. “Stop cheating.”

“It’s not a game,” she says, rolling her eyes. 

He bumps her shoulder with his, the light muffled where he’s set his phone face down on his thigh. He smiles at her, but the look is serious, all dramatic shadows from the streetlights and intent eyes. “No,” he says. ‘It’s not a game.”

Sana doesn’t know what to do with that, she doesn’t know what _anyone_ does with feelings like this, so big that they’re threatening to take over everything. She wants to hide her face so he can’t see the stupid, uncontrollable tenderness that must be written across it. 

“Ask me, then.” Her voice is low, a soft offering. She fingers the velvet ridges of her skirt to still the slight quiver in her hands, the only betrayal of her nerves coating her body from head to toe. 

He peeks at his phone, the light a bright flash in the night.

“If you had your choice of anyone in the world, who would you want to eat?” 

She stares at him, eyebrows coming together in confusion. “Huh?”

He blanches, checks his phone again. “Eat _with!_ Who would you want to eat _with_!” he corrects himself, groaning and covering his face as she breaks out into a full laugh. “Oh my god, fucking hell.”

“It’s very bold to lead with cannibalism,” she comments, trying to maintain a straight face, but cracking up again as he tips over, draping himself dramatically along the lip of the fountain. 

“I have to go now,” he says, covering his face. “I’m leaving the country.”

Sana tugs on the sleeve of his shirt with two fingers, still giggling intermittently. “Okay, okay, it’s not that deep,” she says, wiping at her eyes. He sits up, rubbing at his eyes warily.

She steadies herself, widening her eyes in an attempt to control her smile. 

“I would eat Donald Trump Jr. for dinner with 2Pac. Obviously.”

He stares at her for a moment. “Do you think he’s halal?” he asks, eyes wide with it.

It’s so fucking ridiculous, the whole thing, and they collapse into helpless laughter, one after the other. She finds she loves the sound, wants to bottle it, keep it forever. 

*

Yousef has so many questions and it turns out that she has just as many. She wonders how it’s possible that two people who have known each other as long as they have could still have so much to learn. 

_Are you close with your mom?_

_Do you wish you hadn’t grown up Muslim?_

_What is your best memory?_

_What do you want to do before you die?_

_What do you think makes a good friend?_

_What are you most grateful for?_

The time passes without her consent, carrying them thoughtlessly through the night. She has no idea when it might be when they finally fall quiet. They lay flat on their backs along the edge of the fountain, heads almost touching. Sana looks into the speckled darkness of the night sky, draws the constellations with her gaze. 

She hears him breathe out, shift his weight.

“Do you like me?”

Her heart rate picks up, and she swallows. She’s in too deep, now, even if she wanted to lie.

“No stupid questions,” she murmurs. 

He’s quiet for another moment, and his hand falls to graze the basin of the fountain from where it had been resting on his stomach. Very slowly, she reaches out and hooks her pinky finger with his, tethering them together. 

“If you could have any superpower, what would you choose?” she asks, tilting her chin back up to the sky.

“Mind reading,” he supplies immediately, straining his neck to try and see her expression. His pinkie tightens around hers. 

She closes her eyes, and her cheeks ache with the force of her smile.

*

It’s so late that it must be early by the time they approach her building, shoulders bumping as they walk. She finally digs her phone out of her pocket, and her stomach drops as she sees the time and the dozens of messages that she’s missed.

“I’m in deep shit,” she announces, leaning back against the door. “Everyone thinks I’m dead.”

Yousef looks apologetic, lifts his hat to run a hand through his hair. “Sorry. You can blame it all on me.”

“That worked last time,” she says, shooting off a few texts to a frantic Elias before looking at him and smiling. “Mamma is going to hate your guts.”

“As long as _you_ don’t hate my guts anymore, it’s chill,” he says, putting his hands in his pockets.

“We’re two,” she teases him, yawning. “I mean, we’re cool.”

“ _Okay,_ Sana,” he says emphatically, rolling his eyes. “One last thing.”

She glances up at him, and locks her phone and puts it away when she sees his expression. “What?”

“My research said that if we stare into each other’s eyes for two minutes after all of these questions, we’ll fall in love.”

Her heart clenches at his smile, so excruciatingly lovely. She feels dumb with feelings as the words sink into her brain, helpless with them. 

Sana covers her face with her hands, hoping that maybe a physical barrier will stop the exponential growth of the warmth in her chest, stop her from feeling like she might actually burst with the force of it. 

“Oh my god, are you asking if I want to fall in love with you?” she asks from under the cover of her fingers.

“Why are you being like this?” he asks back, mocking the way she’s covering her face, laughing. “No? Is it a no, then?”

The door opens suddenly, and she falls backward with a yelp. 

Elias catches her with a hand around her bicep, and tugs her up. 

“What the fuck, Sana!” he snaps, eyes darting between them. “Come on, upstairs, before Mamma wakes up. You know she has a fucking spidey sense about these things, _wallah_.”

Sana recovers, pulling her arm out of Elias’ grasp.

“Elias–,” she starts, eyes flickering to Yousef’s panicked face.

“We’ll talk later, Sana, go,” he says, nudging her through the door. At her look, he adds. “I’m not going to kill him, jeeze, it’s Yousef, just go.”

“I’ll text you,” she says, and Yousef nods, raising a hand in parting, before looking warily at Elias. She crosses the threshold and Elias pulls the door shut behind her, leaving her alone in the lobby. 

When she gets to their apartment, she leans against the outside of the front door. Her mind has moved too quickly from the world made of just her and Yousef to this one, with all of its barriers, complications, ugliness, truth. Neither feels real. 

She presses the flat of her palms to her eyes, using the pressure to ground herself. She reaches into her pocket for her keys, pulls them out with her phone, lit up with a message.

_I have a thousand more questions for you_

_❤️_

Another comes in while she’s reading.

_Once Elias stops yelling at me_

Sana breathes out a laugh, covers her face with her elbow as she tips her head back to rest against the door. 

But she knows, she _knows_ it’s completely ridiculous to try to hide something like this, so bright, beautiful, true. She’s got no chance at all.

**Author's Note:**

> this work is posted in real-time (like the show!) @ skamforthepeople on tumblr. && you can find me @ mahistrado! xx see ya next week luvz


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